People are only just realising why Polo mints have a hole in the middle & their minds are blown

THEY'RE known as 'the mint with the hole,' but few people are aware of the actual reason why the popular mint has a unique ring design.

The refreshing, crunchy mints were reportedly created in the UK by Rowntree's employees John Bargewell and George Harris in 1948, and it's thought they took inspiration from a US brand of sweets known as Life Savers, which also had a hole in the middle.

The Nestle website explains: "The idea for the mint was developed in the late 1930s, but due to the Second World War and sugar rationing it was shelved.

"However, in 1948 George Harris was determined to resurrect the idea.

"Before the war George had been inspired by the US brand Life Savers (a mint with a hole designed to look like a life-saving rubber ring) and had decided to make something similar in the UK.

"Company legend has it that he chose the name Polo because it derived from Polar and he thought that this implied the cool freshness of mint."

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So if Polos drew inspiration from Life Savers, how did the popular US sweets get their shape?

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According to a forum on Quora, Life Savers sweets were developed after an increasing number of child deaths were reported as a result of choking on hard sweets that had got stuck in their throats.

So the sweets were designed with a hole in the middle so that a person could still breathe if the sweet did find itself lodged in their throat.

"In the early 20th century, a number of child deaths in the US were reported in the press due to choking on bar candies," one person theorised.

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"An enterprising candy manufacturer came up with the idea that if there was a hole in the candy, even if it became lodged in the throat, a person could still breathe.

"The new candy was marketed as a 'life saver'.

"The fact that the candy now resembled the flotation devices on ships served to reinforce the image and attractiveness of the product to the public. And the rest is history."

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