Thanks, gocomics.org
Tag: sponsors
Notes from a Nutritionists’ Conference
One recent Friday afternoon, in a Mariott Hotel ballroom in Pomona, California, I watched two women skeptically evaluate their McDonald’s lunches. One peered into a plastic bowl containing a salad of lettuce, bacon, chicken, cheese, and ranch dressing. The other arranged two chocolate chip cookies and a yogurt parfait on a napkin. “Eww,” she said, gingerly stirring the layers of yogurt and pink strawberry goop. The woman with the salad nodded in agreement, poking at a wan chicken strip with her plastic fork.
When I asked how they were liking their lunches, both women grimaced and assured me that they “never” go to McDonald’s. So why were they eating it today? Well, they didn’t really have a choice. The women were registered dietitians halfway through day two of the annual conference of the California Dietetic Association. They were hoping to rack up some of the continuing education credits they needed to maintain their certification. McDonald’s, the conference’s featured sponsor, was the sole provider of lunch. “I guess it’s good to know that they have healthier options now,” said the woman with the salad…
As I wandered the exhibition hall, I saw that McDonald’s wasn’t the only food company giving away freebies. Cheerful reps at the Hershey’s booth passed out miniature cartons of chocolate and strawberry milk. Butter Buds offered packets of fake butter crystals. The California Beef Council guy gave me a pamphlet on how to lose weight by eating steak. Amy’s Naturals had microwave brownies. The night before, Sizzler, California Pizza Kitchen, Boston Market, and other chain restaurants had hosted a free evening buffet for conference-goers…
This is not the only powerful nutritionists’ group with strong corporate ties. The sponsors of the School Nutrition Association’s 2013 annual conference included PepsiCo, Domino’s Pizza, and Sara Lee. SNA made headlines recently when it asked Congress to lift the rule that students must take fruits and vegetables on the lunch line, and to ease the rules around sodium and whole grains…
Toward the end of the day, I spoke to a 65-year-old retired dietitian from Orange County. She told me she’d been attending CDA’s annual conferences for 30 years. Shaking her head, she said that she didn’t approve of the trend of junk-food sponsors. “I guess they need the money, but this is pathetic,” she said, rolling her eyes. She found the McDonald’s lunch particularly deplorable. “A dietitian you’d expect to be principled,” she said. “But here I feel like we’re sleeping with the enemy.”
Well said.
The songs we sang 50 years ago about a plastic fantastic society are silenced.
Boring and snoring, the moneyboys turned journalists into marionettes, doctors into makeup artists, grassroots organizers into anarchist performance art. The professions are more thoroughly owned than ever before.
The remainder may speak reams of truth; but, they command no content providers. Peer reviewed journals and gallery openings haven’t yet turned undifferentiated anger into successful dissent.
But, keep on rocking in the Free World.
Stove Top stuffing sponsors hot air in bus shelters
In the latest example of a trend that is becoming increasingly popular among advertisers, heated air will descend from the roofs of 10 bus shelters in Chicago, courtesy of the Stove Top brand of roast meat stuffing sold by Kraft Foods. From Tuesday through the end of this month, Kraft is arranging for the company that builds and maintains the bus shelters, JCDecaux North America, to heat them, trying to bring to life the warm feeling that consumers get when they eat stuffing, according to Kraft.
Such “experiential marketing” is intended to entice consumers to experience products or brands tangibly, rather than bombarding them with pitches.
It is a response to the growing ability of consumers to ignore or avoid traditional advertising, thanks to technology like digital video recorders. Experiential marketing is also an acknowledgment that products and brands must offer alternatives to the interruptive model of peddling, which disrupts what consumers want to watch, read or hear. That model has been the mainstay of advertising for more than a half-century.
Other brands wooing consumers with experiential efforts during the holidays in major markets include the ABC Family cable channel, Burger King, Jameson Irish whiskey, Memorex audio products, Remy Martin Cognac and TD Bank.
Uh, I want to know where they’re doing the experiential marketing for Jameson.
Eideard 