5 ms·
Their marketing is designed to sell cereal. People unfortunately are happiest (short term) to consume sugary cereal. They really are. I met a breakfast food op
by jzwinck 10y ago
Their marketing is designed to sell cereal. People unfortunately are happiest (short term) to consume sugary cereal. They really are.
I met a breakfast food operative in the supermarket once. I told him I thought his company should offer a low sugar version. He said everyone tells them to do so, but once it's on the shelves it does not sell.
People want less sugar in the abstract. But they love sugar in their shopping carts, in the mornings, and in their mouths.
- maus42 10y ago...extra tax for high-sugar products?
- Erwin 10y agoWe tried a tax on fatty foods in Denmark and it was a huge mess. People would just drive to Germany to get the stuff, and managing it was an administrative nightmare: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/13/business/global/fat-tax-in-denmark-is-repealed-after-criticism.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/13/business/global/fat-tax-in...
- jacobush 10y agoThat's like taxing it only in Idaho. Of course it must be done in an economic block, like the US or the EU or China.
- rlucas 10y agoInteresting anecdote, but 1. It's quite possible (though it's a huge rabbit hole we shouldn't plumb here) that they were taxing the wrong macronutrient entirely, that is to say, that fat on the body is more a factor of sugar going in than fat going in. So in addition to imposing costs it may have failed to give benefits (whereas had it worked to improve health outcomes maybe it would have been worth the costs of enforcement etc.) 2. The Danes taxing butter?!? That seems extremely odd given the dairy industry and culture. But I suppose major kudos for being able to overcome such prior biases to even run the experiment.
- mikeash 10y agoSo they're not encouraging people to consume sugary stuff, they're encouraging people to consume a category of food where people prefer sugary stuff? This is about as sensible as saying that Krispy Kreme isn't pushing sugary foods, people just happen to prefer donuts with lots of sugar in them.
- fucking_tragedy 10y agoThe market forces companies to peddle garbage to children who generally lack the capacity to make a healthy informed decision in the face of multimillion dollar campaigns designed to get them to consume sugary cereal? > He said everyone tells them to do so, but once it's on the shelves it does not sell. People want less sugar in the abstract. But they love sugar in their shopping carts, in the mornings, and in their mouths. This sounds a little too just-so.
- GordonS 10y ago> peddle garbage to children who generally lack the capacity to make a healthy informed decision I don't know many kids that do the shopping :) It's parents that choose the sugary breakfast cereals for their children. I think many have the capacity to make a healthy, informed decision, but for some reason they do not. Marketing is likely at least part of the reason.
- fucking_tragedy 10y agoHow many cereal advertisements do you see marketing towards parents vs their children? Companies know they influence purchasing decisions through the manipulation of children.