Have you ever noticed what companies dominate food advertising in the media???
All the nutritionally devoid, junk food ones!
McDonald’s, Burger King, Coke, Pepsi, Doritos, and countless other big name junk brands bombard our TV’s, radio’s, and magazines with ads everyday featuring their awful products! To people, especially children, who are impressionable and not informed about health and nutrition, these ads seem appealing and often convincing.
Marketing towards kids, especially, by the junk food industry is causing so many health problems in our nation. Think about it….right now our country is the “fattest” (meaning at the highest rate of obesity) it’s ever been and so many diseases that were once considered ‘adult’ diseases are being seen in children more and more often.
Not only are junk food ads increasing and causing consumers to make poor health choices, but ‘fake’ health food ads are on the rise as well. Think 100 calorie packs, sugar free jello, and ALL those diet drinks! I get so frustrated every time I see one of those Special K diet commercials…..no one can live on cereal alone people! And plus if you were going to eat cereal all day long, why not choose one with some nutrition at least……Special K is full of simple carbs and refined sugars!
The point of this long rant is that I would really like to see more health food advertising out there! There are so many amazing health food companies and products, but such little marketing and advertising for them. I am lucky enough to be introduced to a ton of great companies through the blogging community, but for the people (the majority of the population actually) that aren’t involved in our little corner of the web, how are they ever supposed to find out about all the healthy products out there? If companies would start some national advertising campaigns or if the government would start investing in up and coming health food companies, society would realize the options they have when choosing their food!
Whatever food we put in our carts is an indicator to the food industry about what we want to see on the market. If more people knew about healthy food and nutrition, more of that food would make it in to our carts, and companies (the not so healthy ones) would be forced to reform their product’s nutrition standards.
Don’t get me wrong there are some health food companies that are paving the way in marketing to the public and informing people about the benefits of healthy eating. Props to theses guys:
*Fage
*Silk
Okay, I’ll get off my soap box now! Sorry for this long ramble, but this article popped up on my Stumble Upon page and after reading it, it really got me thinking.
So what are your thoughts on the food industry and all the unhealthy advertising that is going on?
What health food companies do you think should be doing more advertising?
There are so many companies out there I would love to see more marketing for. Our blogs can only do so much publicizing, the rest of the country needs to be exposed to things like Larabars (my friend had never even heard of these before!), Ezekiel bread, and Siggi’s<-some of my fave brands right thuuuur!
Well that’s all for me tonight! It’s gonna be so hard for me to get to sleep tonight because tomorrow I find out my SAT scores! YIKES! I am nervous/anxious/excited!
PS: Thanks for all your positive comments lately about my knee injury…they are definitely helping me stay positive!
20 responses to “Wise Advertising”
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When I was deeply involved in my ED most days all I would eat is one bowl of special k. Now it makes me cringe, I could never eat that stuff anymore. Yes it’s “low calorie” but the long list of ingredients on that sucker is crazy!
I think it’s best to ignore the food industry media. There will always be new news about whats “healthy” and whats not it’s just ridiculous.
I totally agree!
hear hear. i am so sick of people telling me to eat special K. yeah, it’s yummy but i’m not going to eat it because it’s not /really/ healthy. i also think substituting 2 meals for special K is stupid. that means you would only get one ‘real’ meal a day and who can live on that?
I just checked out my SAT scores!! I did pretty well, but it was my first time. I’ll probably take them again one more time.
I wish there was more advertising for eating WHOLE foods, like fruit and vegetables and what not. That’s more important than eating the healthy processed food in my opinion. Though healthy processed food is a step in the right direction.
I love this! I would totally love to see some commercials for fruits, veggies, and dairy! That would be so informative for the public and so encouraging!
AMEN!!!! it actually makes so FRUSTRATED when i see my friends all like ‘yeah special k will make you skinny’ and all that shitizzle.. its SOO annoying- why are companies trying to trick us?! RUDE
I don’t know! They try and trick the public in to eating crap food all the time!
I think the media is definitely responsible for a lot of the obesity epidemic that is going on. Cereals chockful of sugar are claiming to help you lose weight. McDonalds has taken over the TV, it’s really sad to see people with such horrible eating habits 🙁
YES! That is so true about little kids! I read about a study that was done where little kids were shown pictures of famous brands and almost all of them recognized Ronald McDonald and Coke more than another brands! Its absolutely crazy!
Uggggh I hate when I hear my friends kids saying their favorite food is McDonalds!! And so many of my friends have tried that Special K diet thing! I wish people could just understand that eating real food is where its at!! And not listen to all the bs they see on tv.
Girl, I couldn’t have said it better myself! I so agree with everything you said in this post…amazingly written!
And I’m with you on the Larabars…the whole universe should know about them for sure!
Thanks for the sweet compliment!
I just wanted to say thank you so much for the sweet words from my guest post on Carrie’s blog! It’s led me to find yours and I couldn’t be more happy I did! 🙂 Newest follower right here! xoxo
Thanks so much for stopping by! Yeah I totally loved your guest post!
Yeah those stats are nuts! All that money should be going to promote health foods not crap food that does nothing for our bodies….
Such a great post! I hate how the diet foods companies are twisting their advertising to make their products seem more natural/healthy.
That Special K diet makes me cringe. There was an ad for it in one of my magazines and I think the daily meals were like the Special K cereal for breakfast, a Special K bar for a mid morning snack (I’ve tried those, they’re not filling at ALL and filled with sugar), a protein drink for lunch (I can’t even begin to say how frustrated that makes me), crackers for a snack (like 10…how does that satisfy hunger?!), and a very small plate of pasta for dinner (more carbs and no fruit/veggies in there! 🙁 ) Anyway, the whole concept of the Special K diet makes me upset, and it’s awful to think that people feel that starving themselves this way will make them thinner/happier/healthier.
Megan
P.S. Love the new addition to your blog header! 🙂 So cute!
Just wanted to say “hi” and that I love that teenage you is a part of our community!
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