Jokes are cool again

They were once as much a part of eating ice cream as licking the final drips off your chin.

Reading the jokes and riddles on Wall's ice cream sticks kept generations of British children laughing (and groaning).

But since 1988, the jokes have been phased out, victims of more sophisticated tastes - and the fact that overseas customers failed to see the funny side because they were only printed in English.

Since then, children have had to rely on Christmas crackers for classic gags such as 'What nut has no shell? A doughnut.'

But thanks to popular demand, the ice cream jokes are about to come out of the deep freeze.

Wall's, the country's oldest ice-cream maker, is bringing them back as it relaunches one of its most successful lollies, the Funny Foot.

Despite generating up to £10million in sales per year at one time the strawberry and vanilla lolly, with its distinctive foot shape, was dropped in 1988.

With so many other nostalgic products making a comeback, Wall's decided it was time to reintroduce Funny Foot - along with those jokes.

In company surveys, 90 per cent of parents wanted the jokes back for their own children to enjoy.

The new Funny Foot will be almost identical to the old favourite - with the addition of a crunchy chocolate big toe. Not all the old jokes will return, though.

'What lies quivering at the bottom of the ocean? A nervous wreck' won't be appearing. However, 'What makes a tree noisy? Its bark', will.

Wall's, based in Gloucester, is getting over the language problems by printing each joke on the sticks in German and Greek, as well as English.

Yesterday Gaby Vreeken, director of business for the company, said: 'Millions of British children grew up laughing at jokes on their lolly sticks. Having spoken to our customers we realised the gags, although often terrible, were being missed. Bringing them back on the Funny Foot seemed like the perfect opportunity.'