Cereal has been around since the late 19th century – the very first one was created by health reformer and doctor, James Caleb Jackson, in 1863 – but it wasn't until almost 70 years later, in the late 1930s, that sugary cereals were introduced. The first sugared cereal in the United States, introduced in 1939, was called Ranger Joe Popped Wheat Honnies, a pre-sweetened cereal that kicked off the sugary breakfast revolution (the company also had another cereal called Rice Honnies.) It was eventually bought out by Nabisco and renamed Wheat Honnies.
Eventually, other companies began following suit, and shortly after, Kellogg's introduced Sugar Frosted Flakes and Super Sugar Smacks, which contained 56% sugar by weight and were a huge hit with children. Large corporations began to market these sugary breakfasts specifically to children, adding mascots that told a story and appealed even more to the younger demographic. A recent study found that children were more likely to try a new item if it had a popular character on it. (One cereal company even had a dog as a mascot but it looked nothing like Wild Thang, the Pekingese who won the 2024 "World's Ugliest Dog" contest).
According to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), 92% of cold cereals contain added sugar, and while sugary cereals were once highly popular in the United States, according to a 2023 article in the Wall Street Journal, they have been on the decline in recent years as people focus more on protein and less on sugar and carbohydrates. But throughout much of the 20th century, it wasn't out of the ordinary to eat pure sugar in ice-cold milk for breakfast. For those who grew up on breakfast cereal, the nostalgia runs deep for our old favorites, especially those we'll likely never taste again.
24/7 Tempo compiled a list of beloved breakfast cereals no longer available. While it is not a complete archive of discontinued flavors, it includes many cereals that were released in conjunction with a popular movie or cartoon and subsequently disappeared when the hype died down. Also listed are cereals that have since been reformulated to appeal to changing tastes or, interestingly, to address parental concerns over the color of their children's stool. It is not always clear when some of the cereals were discontinued. We contacted customer relations representatives to confirm each cereal was removed from the market. For cereals without an exact end year, we listed the decade.
Major food companies employ virtual armies of chefs, food scientists, and marketing gurus dedicated to rolling out new products. They please us with their vivid flavors and attractive textures — and when they eventually disappear from the shelves, as many of them do, we end up missing them — here are 40 popular discontinued snack foods we really miss.
Here are beloved breakfast cereals that are no longer available.
