In a tweet on Tuesday, the company’s account wrote a thread of posts with possible Welsh place names under the question: ‘A place in Wales or someone sat on a keyboard?’

It listed places like the village of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, which has the second-longest official single-word place name in the world (after New Zealand’s Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu).

Other contenders were Rhosllanerchrugog and Penmaenmawr, both real places in North Wales.

A user named New Cymru replied: ‘Maybe if you replace ‘Welsh’ with another language you’d see how bigoted this comes across.’

‘Offending a few million Welsh and a few million Welsh-Americans not great on [the] business side of things as well!’

Jac Jolly wrote: ‘Our beautiful Language is constantly belittled , we will do everything we can to stop that Ridicule, we will keep Yr iaith Gymraeg [the Welsh language] living, Cymrophobic people and companies like @SNICKERSUK threaten its survival , we won’t stand for that.

Dan Jardine, a producer with Welsh-language TV channel S4C, replied: ‘Take a lesson in the Welsh language and culture, Snickers – you’re not you when you’re hungry.

‘Rethink this – there are three million of us that you’re about to lose as customers.’

Some were bemused by the ferocity of the pile-on, which included accusations of racism and threats of lifetime boycotts.

Eleanor Johnston wrote: ‘Seriously?! I’m Welsh and not offended by this at all! When were jokes banned?!’

Snickers, which is made by American conglomerate Mars, has since apologised.

The company’s social media team said they are ‘hugely and wholeheartedly thankful’ to their Welsh fans in the UK and all over the world and ‘promise not to let ill-informed tweets ruin this relationship any further’.