On Valentine's Day, as most people probably know, only the girls generally give chocolate. A month later, on White Day, men return the favour. It's not an entirely symmetrical arrangement since girls will often give giri choco gifts to their bosses or coworkers but they won't always get anything back. Morinaga is now trying to encourage men to feel free to give chocolate on Valentine's day itself. To that end, they have just introduced a range of specific gyaku choco or "reverse chocolates". This is a version of their Dars chocolate offering with the label printed backwards. The chocolates themselves also have the logo in reverse just in case people think Morinage is just slipping the old stuff into a new wrapper. You might have a vague sense that this is a creative response to some underpaid part-timer accidentally producing a duff batch after they installed some new Chinese equipment over the holidays. However, Morinaga insists the company is expecting men will want to surprise the girls in their lives with this novelty product. They say that a survey of 500 males from their teens to their 50s revealed 92% had heard of gyaku choco but only 6% said they actually gave chocolates on Valentine's Day. A survey by another chocolate company revealed that less than 10% of girls say they have received chocolates on February 14th. Morinaga believes it can up this rate by giving men a ready-made option and is selling a 12 chocolate selection for 105 yen and a 48 stick box for 179 yen until the middle of February.
