| Type | Candy manufacturer |
| Owner(s) | M. David Benson |
| Featured in | Lost (2004) and several other works |
- “Guess what's coming into your orbit? New bar with the great big taste, Apollo!”
- ―Apollo Candy Company commercial
The Apollo Candy Company is a fake candy manufacturer responsible for producing the Apollo candy bar. It is a frequently used prop conceived and sold by the prop makers at Independent Studio Services for use in various television shows and films as a placeholder for real candy bars, with Apollo's first appearance being in the 2004 television series Lost where it received its most appearances and elaboration.
Overview
Starting with only the milk chocolate recipe given to him by his grandfather, Oskar Benson, M. David Benson began the Apollo Candy Company in 1962, out of a one-room factory in San Francisco´s legendary Cow Hollow district. By 1964, Benson had perfected the recipe for his affordable, yet exceptionally delicious, Apollo Bars, and began distributing them citywide. By 1968, the fledgling company had secured distribution outlets nationwide.
Sadly, in the early 1970s, the Apollo Candy Company fell into dire straits. However, due to the considerable financial intervention of Alvar Hanso, founder of the worldwide philanthropic organization, The Hanso Foundation, the company was saved from bankruptcy... and infused with new life. Today, the Apollo Candy Company is alive and well as the private purveyor of chocolates for Alvar Hanso and his many companies.
Foundation
Apollo Candy Advert (2006)
The Apollo Candy Company was founded by famed chocolatier M. David Benson, creator of the Apollo Bar and who serves as the company's current president, having first conceived his popular candy after a life-altering experience during the Korean War which set him on the path to establishing his ever popular candy company.
But even before Benson's venture into candy, his family had long run its own candy manufacturing company by the name of Benson Chocolatiers which conceived the original recipe for the Benson Candy Bar. Following the company's own bankruptcy, M. David Benson would renew his family's legacy in the form of the Apollo Candy Company and with an improved and even more affordable successor to his family's classic candy bar, renaming it "The Apollo Bar".
Never in his wildest dreams could M. David Benson have imagined how this moment would change everything. It was 1964. He had just delivered, from the back of his beast-to-the-bolts 1959 Jeep FC-150, the very first crate of Apollo Bars to San Francisco´s legendary J.Pickersweet´s Five and Dime.
Benson knew this was the moment of truth. If Pickersweet liked what you had to sell, profit and prosperity would most certainly follow. But if he took issue with your product. Benson held his breath as Pickersweet bit into the impossibly rich, unimaginably creamy Apollo Bar. A full, heart-wrenching ten seconds passed. And then, the miraculous happened. Pickersweet´s mustache curled up above a grin that stretched from ear to ear. The Apollo Bar had landed in the Golden Gate City.
Staff
President
M. David Benson, founder of the Apollo Candy Company
Born in 1938, M. David Benson was the child of Nils Christer Benson, son of Oskar Benson, found of Scandinavian´s revered Benson Chocolatiers. Some would say Benson was a child of strife. His grandfather, Oskar Benson was a man of tradition. Upon learning of his son´s engagement to a woman well below his station, Oskar turned his back on Nils, cutting him from the family inheritance. Leaving Norway, with his pregnant wife, Elli, Nils established a new life in the U.S., joining the U.S. Marine Corps in December of 1941. Sadly, however, Nils Benson lost his life on Omaha Beach just a few short years later. Like many immigrants, the widowed Elli Benson, felt a strong sense of patriotism for her adopted country. Her husband had died defending America, and M. David Benson was raised to cherish his homeland.
M. David Benson served America in the Korean War and recounts the moment when he, too, discovered that chocolate ran through his veins:
- “The six of us were pinned down - scared witless. I knew we´d be lost if we didn´t come together. So I rifled through my pack and found it -- The Benson Chocolate Bar mom had sent. They were expensive. She was poor. But once a month like clockwork, there was that care package. Six ways, I split that chocolate, and even with death staring at us in the eye, not a one of us could deny the smile on his face. It was dead midnight, but for that sweet moment, as we ate that Benson Bar, the sun came up for us all.”
- ―M. David Benson after his chocolate epiphany
It was in that foxhole that M. David Benson first envisioned the Apollo Bar. Less than two years later, that vision had become a reality. And, the rest, as they say, is history.
The Apollo Bar
The Apollo Bar
The Apollo Bar is the signature product of the Apollo Candy Company with its recipe originally conceived by the Benson family of chocolatiers as the Benson Bar and the recipe was passed on by Oskar Benson to his grandson, M. David Benson who would go on to perfect the recipe and turn it into the international success now known as a the Apollo Bar.
Following the end of Mr. Benson's military tour, he would bring the Benson Bar to America, but with a change. He would make it affordable, but with no sacrifice to quality, so that every American, regardless of class, creed or station could come together through the simple delight of the world´s richest, creamiest, milk chocolate.
Bringing this proposal to his grandfather, a man he barely knew, Benson was devastated to learn Benson Chocolatiers had gone under, the brand sold to a British candy manufacturer. However, Oskar Benson had a surprise for his grandson. Having missed out on his childhood, hoping only to reconnect after so many regretful years, Oskar Benson offered his grandson the most valuable of family secrets: the original, secret recipe for Benson Milk Chocolate.
Working from this recipe, it was only a matter of time before M.David Benson concocted the recipe for "The Apollo Bar", a confection fit for even the Greek god of light himself for which it was named.
The Jeep
The Jeep
The "Jeep" is the star vehicle and pseudo-mascot of the Apollo Candy Company, serving as the pride and joy of its founder, M. David Benson. The story of Mr. Davidson and his jeep dates all the way back to the founding of the company. After Mr. Davidson had perfected the Apollo Bar's recipe, he found himself in a predicament: he'd spent all but his last cent on starting the company--which left him no means to travel around and hawk his sensational new chocolates. The short of it? He needed a truck, and fast. But, how? And which truck? This was no small decision. Choosing a distribution vehicle was about more than just getting a box of Apollo Bars from here to there. Whatever Benson chose to drive, he knew it would forever be associated with the Apollo Candy Company. It would represent him, his family, and the image of the company he was trying to lift off the ground -- for good or for ill.
Luckily, fortune smiled on Benson once again. A close friend had just moved to the Big Apple and had no more need for his 1959 Jeep FC-150 Truck. It was beaten up, dirty, looked like it had no business rolling on city streets, but Benson took one look at that jeep and knew it was the perfect truck -- not only was it affordable, it was a vehicle as rugged and durable as the American spirit.
600,000 miles and 44 years later. Benson still prefers his Jeep FC-150 to the other vehicles in his fleet. As he's been know to boast, "Apollo himself would gladly give up both horse and chariot for a chance to ride in my Jeep FC-150!"
Appearances
Apollo candy bar in Lost, "Not In Portland".
Since the Apollo candy bar's debut on Lost, its various candy props have since appeared in various films and TV shows as both Easter Eggs and due to the props being frequently recycled by the prop makers at Independent Studio Services and instances of recycled props are not examples of a shared continuity.[1]
Television
- Lost (2004)
- "Pilot, Part 1"
- "Adrift"
- "Everybody Hates Hugo"
- "One of Them"
- "S.O.S."
- "Not in Portland"
- "Flashes Before Your Eyes"
- "The Man from Tallahassee"
- "The Man Behind the Curtain"
- "Cabin Fever"
- "The Incident, Part 2"
- "The Substitute"
- "Lighthouse"
- "The Candidate"
- "The End"
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine (2013)
- "Bureau" (S3E22)
- Scrubs (2001)
- "My Own Worst Enemy" (S7E01)
- "My Chief Concern" (S8E17)
- Squeegees (2008)
- Web Episode 2
- Dead of Summer (2016)
- "The Dharma Bums" (S1E06)
Films
- The Purge: Election Year (2016)
Video Games
- The Lost Experience (2006)
Gallery
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Trivia
The real Apollo candy company founded in 1903
- There existed a real brand of Apollo brand candies conceived by Fred H. Roberts and distributed by his F.H. Roberts Company starting in 1903 which quickly grew from simple chocolates to many other assorted candies and even opening their own chain of candy stores, but following Roberts' death in 1920, the brand's endurance began to wane and his company would go on to be sold several times.
- M. David Benson was based on ABC employee Michael Benson.
- Apollo and the typeface style used for its products are evocative of the Wonka Candy Company seen in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
An "Abollo" bar in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
- A parody of Apollo dubbed "Abollo" appears in the 2011 video game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 in the game's multiplayer map "Underground" where several Abollo bars are seen on a shelf containing various snacks and other goods, with the bars even using the same wrapping and typeface as the Apollo bars.