Chocolate Bar Design for Free Willy Wonka

Every once in a while, I will see a new chocolate candy flavor or candy bar combination and think to myself, "Wow, that took them long enough to come up with that one or put that one out to the public." This year I want to challenge my students to design their own new charbolate bar combo like a Chunky or Snickers or even a new M&M flavor.

For years I had my freshmen do marine themed chocolate bars. They design the shape and packaging. The 3.5 ounce chocolate limit forced the student to think about an individual bar design. Of course I would get starfish and anchors, but one year, I got one designed to be 1st Sgt. Nelson, one of our Naval Science instructors at the time because he was a marine!

Situation
The “Free Willy Wonka” chocolate manufacturer is looking for a new line of marine themed solid or mixed ingredient  3.5 ounce chocolate bars to market along the coast (of a Spanish speaking country).


Design Brief

Design, develop and produce a 3.5-ounce solid or mixed ingredient chocolate bar and package with a marine theme that would be sold to teenage locals and tourists along the coast (of a Spanish speaking country, if you dare). Prepare a mold for the chocolate bar using clay and polystyrene sheet plastic in the vacuum former. (If you do  not have a vacuum former, you might be able to make silicone molds using a home brew from youtube.)

 

Specifications

Chocolates must:
Ø  Depict a marine theme in name and shape.
Ø  Be designed for a predetermined location.
Ø  Be solid chocolate unless other ingredients can be mixed in easily during manufacture of the bar.
Ø  Be 3.5-ounces, whether solid chocolate or mixed with other ingredients.
Ø  Note, the design could be an imprint of sealife or in the shape of sealife. 

Package/Wrapper must:
Ø  Be designed with the design principles in mind.
Ø  Be designed with the clientele in mind.
Ø  Use minimal materials efficiently and effectively.
Ø  Depict the theme of the chocolate bar.
Ø  Look professional.
Ø  Be reproducible for mass production.
Ø  Include all pertinent information about the product name, the company name, the weight, the nutritional and the ingredients.  And any other information deemed important to the product or design.

Documentation must:
Ø  Be neat and organized in a design portfolio with a cover page and table of contents.
Ø  Include design brief in student’s words on the cover page with student name, project and homeroom.  Include clientele that you choose in design brief. (typed)
Ø  Include specification of the chocolate bar and package/wrapper.
Ø  Include evidence of research on shapes, names and packaging gathered from candy wrappers, packages, Internet searches, etc.  All evidence must be annotated.
Ø  Include completed note sheets on density as part of the research.
Ø  Include procedure for determining the density of chocolate and the volume of 3.5 ounces of chocolate. (typed)
Ø  Include procedures for determining the density of clay and the mass of the same volume of chocolate. (typed)
Ø  Include procedure/recipe for making modeling dough.
Ø  Include evidence of brainstorming through sketches and annotations of chocolate bar, names and packaging.
Ø  Include further research specific to idea selection.
Ø  Include selection statement discussing pros and cons of each idea and your final selection to develop. Only discuss relevance to specifications and clientele. (typed)
Ø  Include orthographic views of chocolate and package.
Ø  Include isometric views and rendering of chocolate bar.
Ø  Include a flat layout of the package and details.  Include all flaps and tabs.
Ø  Include the procedure steps for making the candy bar once you had the design. (typed)
Ø  Include a written defense of your solution.  Don’t discuss design principles.  Discuss relevance to specifications. (typed)
Ø  Include design and self-evaluation. (typed)

Assignment

1.     Brainstorm ideas for chocolate bar form, name and package with the marine theme in mind. (4 each)
2.     Complete density, volume and mass lab for chocolate and clay. And maybe dough.
3.     Write procedures (like you do in Chemistry) for labs to be included in portfolio.
4.     Collect information about the animal or theme using clipart, the encyclopedia or Internet on existing shapes, packages and names.
5.     Collect samples of wrappers and packages to study, mount the samples and annotate how package works and what is on the package.
6.     Select the best idea and develop the idea for production.
7.     Mass out enough clay to produce a solid model of your chocolate bar design to use to produce your mold.
8.     Draw orthographic views of chocolate bar form.
9.     Draw isometric view of chocolate bar form.
10.   Render isometric view of chocolate bar form.
11.   Write out the procedure for using the vacuum former when demonstrated in class.
12.   Brainstorm ideas for packaging your chocolate bar.
13.   Design a package/wrapper for your chocolate bar.
14.   Draw a flat opened up view of your package/wrapper with dimensions.  Include the flaps and tabs.
15.   Produce the package/wrapper to fit your real chocolate bar.
16.   Produce your chocolate mold using the vacuum former using a clay model of your design.
17.   Produce your chocolate bar by filling mold with melted chocolate.
18.   Evaluate your work and suggest improvements. See below for criteria of evaluation.
19.   Complete portfolio for submission.
20.   Be prepared to display your design in class and be critiqued by your peers.

Assess any or all of the parts of this project as you see appropriate.



Images from:

All for Cupcakes. Seahorse Chocolate. 2018. Retrieved on 8/13/18 from http://www.allforcupcakes.com/molds/seahorse-candy-mold-1489.html.


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