- MrBeast threw down the gauntlet to Hershey's in a tweet this week.
- The YouTube star seems confident he can take on Hershey's with his Feastables chocolate bars.
MrBeast is squaring up to Hershey's — but he doesn't endorse betting against the chocolate giant's stock.
"I wouldn't recommend shorting a company, seems lame," he tweeted this week. "But I will say these next few years between Feastables and Hershey's will be interesting once I actually ramp up."
MrBeast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, is a 25-year-old YouTuber who's amassed 169 million subscribers with his wacky competitions and big-ticket giveaways. He launched his own line of chocolate bars under the Feastables brand last year, saying he disliked some of the ingredients in American snacks, and felt there was a dearth of innovation in the industry.
Donaldson tweeted in response to an article titled "Problems at Hershey," published by "The Bear Cave" newsletter this week. The article asserted that Feastables — which Donaldson expects to be stocked in as many as 50,000 locations by the end of next year — poses a major threat to the maker of Reese's Pieces and Hershey's Kisses.
The YouTube star's dislike of shorting may endear him to meme-stock traders. Many of them piled into stocks like GameStop and AMC Entertainment in 2021 because they wanted to punish the wealthy hedge funds that were wagering those companies would fail.
Donaldson seems confident he can take on Hershey's, but it might be harder than he thinks. Warren Buffett, whose Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate owns See's Candies, has warned that old habits die hard in the candy business. The famed investor has noted the list of best-selling chocolate bars in the US has remained virtually unchanged for decades.
Buffett even challenged Elon Musk to disrupt the candy business a few years ago, and the Tesla CEO tried and failed to develop a superior candy. However, the Berkshire chief has also underlined the power of a strong brand, as it allows companies to raise prices without losing their loyal customers to competitors.
If MrBeast can imbue Feastables with his own personal brand, he might beat the odds and break off a nice piece of the candy market.