"Eh-mazon" 📦🍁
When Amazon launched its Canadian website in 2002, it didn't start with everything — it initially only sold these two categories, the same ones Jeff Bezos originally sold in the U.S.
What are books and music?
This Canadian rapper, who started as a child actor on the teen drama Degrassi: The Next Generation, later became one of the best-selling music artists in the world — and is closely associated with his hometown of Toronto.
Who is Drake?
In 1992, PepsiCo launched this clear, caffeine-free cola with a massive ad campaign featuring Van Halen's "Right Now." Despite the hype, consumers found a see-through cola just too weird, and it was discontinued within a year.
What is Crystal Pepsi? (also accept "Crystal Clear Pepsi")
At Tim Hortons, a "double double" refers to a coffee prepared with two creams and two of this sweet substance.
What is sugar?
These small, teardrop-shaped Hershey's chocolates individually wrapped in foil are a Halloween bowl staple, and their name is a synonym for a smooch.
What are Hershey's Kisses?
Amazon's fulfillment centers use a system of robots — acquired when Amazon bought this robotics company in 2012 for $775 million — to move shelves of products directly to human workers for packing.
What is Kiva Systems? (also accept "Kiva" — now called Amazon Robotics)
The sport of basketball was invented in 1891 by James Naismith, a Canadian-born physical education instructor, while he was teaching at a YMCA training school in this U.S. state.
What is Massachusetts? (Springfield, Massachusetts — also accept "Springfield")
In the 1980s, a toothpaste company best known for its "ring of confidence" tried to diversify into frozen dinners with a line called "Kitchen Entrees." The product flopped spectacularly — shoppers couldn't shake the mental image of minty-fresh flavor when buying a beef lasagna.
What is Colgate? (also accept "Colgate-Palmolive")
💥 DAILY DOUBLE! — Canadians consume more of this pasta product per capita than any other country in the world.
What is macaroni and cheese? (also accept "mac and cheese" — do NOT accept "Kraft Dinner" or "KD," since the clue is asking for the product, not the brand)
This is the world's best-selling candy bar. Made by Mars, Inc., it features peanuts, nougat, caramel, and milk chocolate — and its name sounds like a type of laugh.
What is Snickers?
In 2014, Amazon acquired this live-streaming platform — originally created for gamers — for nearly $1 billion. Today it's one of the world's most-visited websites.
What is Twitch? (also accept "Twitch.tv")
In hockey, a "Gordie Howe hat trick" is achieved when a player records a goal, an assist, and this third thing — all in the same game.
What is a fight? (also accept "a fighting major" or "getting in a fight")
In 2014, Amazon reviews for a bag of Haribo sugar-free gummy bears went mega-viral when hundreds of customers described, in hilariously graphic detail, the extreme digestive "consequences" caused by this sugar substitute that the bears contained.
What is lycasin? (also accept "maltitol," "sugar-free sweetener," "sugar alcohol," or just "the sugar substitute" — be generous here)
This condiment became a patriotic cause in 2016 when Canadians rallied to buy it over the competing Heinz version, after Heinz closed its Ontario plant.
What is mustard? (specifically French's mustard — accept "mustard" or "French's mustard")
This candy, invented in Austria in 1927, comes in a small, rectangular dispenser with a flip-top head — often shaped like a cartoon character. Collectors obsess over rare dispensers, and a Convention dedicated to them is held annually.
What is PEZ?
💥 DAILY DOUBLE! — In 2014, Amazon released a smartphone with a unique "Dynamic Perspective" feature that used four front-facing cameras to create a 3D effect. The device was widely considered a flop and was discontinued within a year. Its name matched a natural disaster.
What is the Fire Phone?
💥 DAILY DOUBLE! — This Canadian comedy series, set in a small rural Ontario town, became a cult hit when it debuted on Crave in 2016. Characters like Wayne, Daryl, and Squirrely Dan are known for their rapid-fire wordplay, and the show's opening often features someone asking "How are ya now?" with the standard reply: "Good 'n' you?"
What is Letterkenny?
The modern grocery store as we know it — with self-service aisles instead of clerks fetching items — was pioneered in 1930 by a store called King Kullen in this New York City borough.
What is Queens? (specifically Jamaica, Queens — accept "Queens" or "Jamaica, Queens")
In Canada, this popular chocolate bar features a wafer and chocolate combination similar to a Kit Kat — but it's made by Cadbury, not Nestlé, and its ads feature a distinctive "P-p-p-pick up a" jingle.
What is a Penguin? (Penguin bar by McVitie's/Cadbury — the jingle is "P-p-p-pick up a Penguin")
Year after year, this chocolate-and-peanut-butter cup — sold by the Hershey Company — ranks as the #1 best-selling candy at Halloween in the United States.
What are Reese's Peanut Butter Cups?
Amazon operates a crowdsourcing marketplace where businesses post small digital tasks — like image labeling or survey responses — and humans complete them for micro-payments. The platform's name references an 18th-century chess-playing "automaton" that secretly had a person hidden inside it.
What is Mechanical Turk? (also accept "Amazon Mechanical Turk" or "MTurk")
While Americans drink Bloody Marys, Canadians prefer this signature cocktail invented in Calgary in 1969, which swaps tomato juice for Clamato — a blend of tomato juice and clam broth. It outsells the Bloody Mary in Canada 4-to-1 and was named the country's official cocktail by Parliament in 2009.
What is a Bloody Caesar?
In 1999, this once-dominant video rental chain passed on the opportunity to buy a small DVD-by-mail startup for $50 million. That startup was Netflix. Within a decade, this chain filed for bankruptcy — making it one of the most infamous "missed opportunities" in business history.
What is Blockbuster?
This Canadian retail chain, founded in Toronto in 1907, is so ingrained in Canadian culture that its catalogs were once the most widely read publications in the country. It also issued its own currency; paper bills given as loyalty rewards that some businesses actually accept as payment.
What is Canadian Tire?
This classic Canadian chocolate bar, made by Cadbury and not widely available in the U.S., features a golden honeycomb toffee (sponge toffee) center coated in milk chocolate.
What is a Crunchie?