Spongebob Popsicles: evidence of declining quality assurance practices?

NewImage

In 2007 a Boing Boing reader shared the above photo of a Spongebob Popsicle that bore little likeness to the well-known cartoon character. (She sent in the photo after seeing my photo of a poorly made Tweety Bird frozen novelty bar.)

Screen Shot 2012 06 18 at 2 18 15 PM
Today, I came across this new photo of a Spongebob Popsicle. It looks even worse than the 2007 Popsicle! At first, I thought that the manufacturing quality had plumbed a new nadir. However, I now suspect that new Popsicle went through a melt-and-refreeze cycle, causing the massive deformation and discoloration we see.

For those tempted to chime in that the nature of frozen novelty bars makes it impossible to reliably produce them with reasonable fidelity to the original character design, I'd like to once again point to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle bar:

NewImage