FACT CHECK: Is The PayDay Candy Bar Changing Its Name?

An image shared on Facebook claims the PayDay candy bar is changing its name because the current name is “offensive to those who don’t work.”

Verdict: False

PayDay is not changing its name. The image appears to have originated on a meme-sharing website.

Fact Check

The July 29 Facebook post, which has been shared over 290 times, includes a photo of a PayDay candy bar along with text reading: “PayDay candy bar is changing it’s (sic) name because it’s offensive to those who don’t work.”

There is, however, no evidence the candy bar is planning to change its name. PayDay candy bars are currently sold by the Hershey Company. Check Your Fact searched through press releases from the Hershey Company, but found no announcement of a name change. Had the company decided to change PayDay’s name, media outlets likely would have reported on it, yet none have, except to debunk the claim. 

Anna Lingeris, a spokesperson for the Hershey Company, further confirmed that there is no truth to the claim. “PayDay is not changing our name,” Lingeris told Check Your Fact in an email. (RELATED: Is Ben & Jerry’s Discontinuing Its Vanilla Ice Cream To Combat White Supremacy?)

The image has been circulating online since at least July 2020, when it was shared on the meme-sharing website America’s Best Pics & Video. The meme was also shared on the Facebook page, “Is It Funny Or Offensive?” The Facebook page notes in its “About” section that the page is “focused on the complex debate about what’s considered ‘funny’ and what’s labeled ‘offensive.’”

Social media users have since been sharing the image without any indication that it was meant to be a joke, seemingly believing the claim to be true.