Mars Pure Dark: A New Brand and Retail Experience for the Premium Chocolate Market

Mars Pure Dark Chocolate Kiosk

Pure Dark, a new brand and retail experience, enabled Mars to expand their revenue by tapping into the $4 billion premium chocolate market.

When Mars, a major candy company, came to Nottingham Spirk, they were leaders in mass market chocolate with well-known brands such as M&M’s and Snickers. Despite their success in large-scale cocoa production, they recognized the need for an open innovation partner to work with them to address the high-end chocolate market.

Our marketing innovation team began by gathering consumer research to discover the unmet needs of chocolate lovers. In response to customer insights and after a careful industry analysis, we collaborated with Mars to create the Pure Dark name, and design a distinctive product line along with unique packaging and display design, as well as a memorable retail experience. Our marketing, product design, and engineering teams worked closely with Mars’ branding and promotions agencies to create a retail environment that was immersive, interactive, and delivered a heightened sensory experience.

Mars leveraged our open innovation network to create and source packaging materials and to quickly create a new small-scale supply chain, which would have been challenging inside Mars. We worked with Mars in many aspects, from finding a medical supply company that could create an airtight seal for the parchment packaging, to designing modular mobile display components.

Pure Dark opened its first location in the SoHo district of New York City and its most recent store opened in San Francisco in early 2011. Pure Dark continues to sell through various high-end retail partners across the country, and has opened a new premium chocolate market channel for Mars.