Look what the cat dragged in. Himself. Again. Sort of.
Yup, as you may know, the beloved pink panther (that's the cat) wafer came very close to disappearing from shop shelves for good last year when food firm Rivington announced it would be axing nearly 100 jobs at its Wigan factory.
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The company, which made Pink Panther wafers, was already in the red last year when it announced huge redundancies. Rivington argued that these were a necessity after the fall in the value of sterling following the Brexit vote on 23rd June 2016.
Credit: Rivington
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But fear not. The biscuits will hit shelves once more in full swing this June, when London firm Asvina takes over production, although the news will come as little comfort to Rivington's employees.
The company is a big employer in Wigan, a town 16 miles north west of Manchester perhaps most famous for a George Orwell book and an ageing, sports shop-owning football chairman with slightly colourful language and dodgy views.
Wigan voted to leave the EU by nearly 64 percent last year, and the combination of falling profits and the hit on the value of the pound was key to Rivington's decision to cut 99 of its 123 staff.
While the job losses are a big hit to the town, north London food distributor Asvina will ensure the Pink Panther wafers live to fight another day.
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The Stanmore-based company has taken on the wafer brand with a promise to redesign its packaging, give it a new lease of life but keep the same, wonderful, sugary taste as before.
The affordable, crispy, vanilla-cream filled wafers have long been a staple of children's birthday parties and Saturday morning hangovers with weak tea and three sugars, so the news is bound to go down well with parents and piss-heads alike. We can only hope something is put in place to fill the gap left by job losses in Wigan.
The biscuits are just one of many successful spin-offs from the Pink Panther series of films, a franchise that has seen the rose-coloured feline appear in everything from video games to t-shirts, children's toys and even phone covers.
Named after a mysterious diamond (which was supposed to look like a pink panther if you could get close enough to look into it), the naughty kitty has featured in various films since 1963, when he was chased around by hapless French detective Inspector Closeau (played by classic British actor Peter Sellers).
Over the years, the suave, 60s-style cat has been hunted (without success) by everyone from Bond actor Roger Moore to US (sometimes) funnyman Steve Martin.
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He's also had his own children's cartoon show and remains a hit with kids around the world (and a fair number of nostalgic adults), while his enduringly hummable theme tune continues to be a source of joy and frustration to anyone who happens to get it stuck in their head, something which has just happened to you courtesy of us. Sorry about that.
Going back to the biscuits, however, from June 2017, Asvina will resume full production of the family-favourite biscuity treat from its base in Stanmore, a town that gave us Theo Walcott, perhaps the only person alive who can do a disappearing act as consistently as the wily pink kitty.
Words: Ronan O'Shea
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