Cadbury is rolling out its largest U.S. marketing platform in brand history, a multi-year campaign titled "There's Magic in More," using New York Fashion Week as its launch runway. The Hershey Company (NYSE: HSY) debuted the effort through a collaboration with New York-based fashion designer LUAR, positioning Cadbury's XL Bar lineup as the centerpiece of a generosity-themed brand narrative.
The Activation
The campaign's hero piece is the Cadbury Clutch — a limited-edition, insulated handbag crafted in partnership with LUAR Founder and Creative Director Raul Lopez. Just five clutches were produced, each finished in Cadbury's signature jewel-tone purple with gold accents and individually hand-applied Swarovski crystals requiring approximately eight hours of labor per piece. A platinum-silver insulated interior is engineered to keep chocolate at serving temperature. The clutch is not for sale.
The clutch made its runway debut at LUAR's Spring/Summer 2027 show on September 14, carried by NYLON Editor-in-Chief Lauren McCarthy and content creator Tefi Pessoa throughout Fashion Week events including NYLON Nights. Featured SKUs include Cadbury CARAMELLO XL Bars, DAIRY MILK XL, DAIRY MILK Fruit & Nut XL, CARAMELLO Sweetly Dark XL and CARAMELLO Miniatures — the XL format clearly positioned as a sharing-occasion product suited to gifting and impulse retail.
Brand Strategy Context
"There's Magic in More" is framed as a multi-year brand platform, not a seasonal LTO push, signaling a sustained above-the-line investment at a time when confectionery suppliers are under pressure to justify shelf placement and incremental pricing. Hershey's full snacks portfolio — which generated more than $11.7 billion in annual revenues across more than 85 brands — has leaned into occasion-based marketing to defend category velocity against private label encroachment and consumer trade-down behavior.
For foodservice and convenience-channel operators, the campaign is relevant context: Cadbury's XL Bar format is sized and merchandised for impulse purchase at checkout and grab-and-go sets, dayparts where premium confectionery competes directly with energy bars and functional snacks. A high-visibility cultural moment at Fashion Week raises brand awareness in a demographic — urban, premium-oriented — that over-indexes in away-from-home snacking occasions.
Eric Newton, Director of Premium Chocolate at The Hershey Company, described the clutch as bringing the brand's generosity ethos to life through "beautiful craftsmanship, delicious chocolate and an irresistible invitation to open it up and share." Lopez noted that Cadbury's emphasis on quality and detail "mirrors" LUAR's design philosophy, calling the collaboration "bold and beautifully crafted, but designed to be opened and shared."
Consumer Engagement
Beyond the runway, Hershey is layering in a consumer sweepstakes via a Cadbury and NYLON Pay It Forward program, opening September 15. Participants nominate someone who embodies generosity; two selected nominees and their nominators each receive a custom LUAR-designed Cadbury Clutch. The mechanic drives user-generated content while reinforcing the sharing-occasion messaging central to the XL Bar format's retail positioning.
For operators tracking confectionery trends and impulse category performance, the campaign illustrates how major CPG suppliers are investing in cultural credibility — not just trade promotion — to sustain velocity in a category where premium chocolate faces volume headwinds from elevated cocoa costs and consumer price sensitivity.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
