Obesity Caused by Fast Food Marketing

In “The Big Fat Case Against Big Macs,” published in The Washington Post on December of 2002, Ellen Goodman argues that the best lawyers cannot prove that the fast food industry caused the obesity epidemic in its customers, but they may prove that they fooled its customers, especially the young customers. Goodman argues that corporations like McDonalds target young kids by putting toys with their meals to attract them. She also states that they put slogans to make kids think that eating their “Big Kids Meal” will make them grow up faster. The author questions the health consciousness of McDonald’s corporation because why would McDonald’s in France take out an ad telling the parents that kids should eat no more than one hamburger a week when they claim that their food is healthy. Goodman also states that childhood obesity is the result of corporations marketing their products to kids, just like the tobacco industry did. She concludes that this fight with the fast food industry on obesity is just the beginning on the fight with unhealthy foods. The author compares the problem with marketing unhealthy foods to kids to how the tobacco industry use to target kids with their marketing ploy. Although many people feel that childhood obesity starts with the kids overeating, I agree with Goodman that childhood obesity is caused by corporations targeting kids with their marketing because they use toys, slogans and cartoon characters to attract kids to buy their products.

From my experiences of growing up, I remember a lot of commercials of McDonalds. I remember the McDonald’s guy, Ronald McDonald with his white face, big reddish hair, and of course you can’t for get his big red shoes. His character was one that would always make you laugh and put a smile on your face. I would always think growing up that if I go eat at McDonalds a lot that maybe I might have a chance of meeting him. One thing that Goodman talked about was how they would use toys with the meals to attract kids. That was the other reason why I liked McDonalds so much when I was growing up. I use to always nag my parents and aunts to take me to McDonalds just so that I can get the toys. That was one way of them getting me to eat since most of the day I was always hanging out with the neighborhood kids playing sports and what not. Since I always wanted to go to McDonalds, my parents told me the only way they would let me go is if I promised them that I would eat all my food. Now that I look back at it, I can see how the marketing got me. With them putting toys in the kid’s meals, kids always wanted to eat there and parents always wanted to see their kids happy.

In the article “Child-centered marketing causing kids to carry unhealthy food habits into adulthood,” Dani Veracity states that many companies target children as part of their strategy. To meet this demand most major advertising agencies have a dedicated children’s division while some agencies focus only on marketing towards children. It makes sense because it takes a lot of creativity for a kid to remember a product but when they remember it sure does stay with them. This explains why most television commercials and ads always use simple language and have characters that children would love. Kids will not understand big words or phrases and what kid would not like a funny character or one that dresses funny. For instance remember the Budweiser commercials with the frogs and them saying “Bud-weis-errrr”. My little cousins, who were about the age of 5-8 at the time, would always say it. They probably did not know what it meant but they would always recite it. When they grew up they found it was beer. They would always joke about the commercial and would always wonder how the beverage tasted like. Some of them that were in their early teens tried the beer just to see how it would taste like. From than on they would always try to get their hands on that beer. That soon led to drinking other types of beer and eventually hard liquor. Thinking back now, it really does show how marketing can affect children at a young age. They used a phrase that was catchy so that it was easy to remember and say.

In “Food Marketing and Childhood Obesity- A Matter of Policy,” published in The New England Journal of Medicine on June 15, 2006, Dr. Marion Nestle states that “…by two years of age, most children can recognize products in supermarkets and ask for them by name.” Kids that young knowing the names of products is a direct result from marketing. A parent who cares for their child will not teach them names of food that are not healthy to them. Usually at the age of two, kids would be learning how to say the “A-B-Cs” and learning how to count from “1-10”. The only way that kids can learn names of products is by commercials that air on television. Remember the Tony the Tiger from the Kellogg’s commercials.