Skittles is owned by Mars (the United States), which acquired the brand on 6 October 2008 from Wrigley.[1][1] Before Mars, Skittles was owned by Wrigley to 2008.[1]
This ownership is reported in official statements but has not yet been matched to a regulatory filing.
Skittles are sugar-shelled fruit sweets first made in Britain in 1974 and launched in the United States in 1979. The advertising line about tasting the rainbow has run since 1994. Mars acquired the brand with Wrigley in 2008, and its flavour line-ups differ noticeably between markets.
Controlling ownership as of . Brands grouped under the entity that owns them; large groups are collapsed.
Open the full Mars ownership tree →
Mars acquired the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company for $80 a share in cash, financed in part by Berkshire Hathaway and Goldman Sachs. The deal created Mars Wrigley and made Mars the largest confectionery company in the world.
No tagged news items yet. Headlines are added nightly from public feeds; only titles and links are stored.
Headlines link to the original publisher. Brandtree does not reproduce article text.
The parent company of Skittles is Mars, a family-owned company headquartered in the United States.
Skittles originated in the United Kingdom in 1974, but it is owned today by Mars, which is headquartered in the United States. So Skittles is a British-origin brand under American ownership.
Mars completed its acquisition of Skittles on 6 October 2008, after announcing the deal on 28 April 2008.
Before Mars, Skittles was owned by Wrigley until 2008.
Yes. As of 6 September 2026, Skittles is still owned by Mars. The ownership record was last checked against primary sources on that date.
Last verified . Every ownership fact above is backed by one of these primary documents. Numbers in brackets in the text refer to this list.
Report a correction Opens a pre-filled GitHub issue. See our corrections policy.