Food marketers are under siege. Some activists are pushing for a total ban on marketing to kids. Some cities like mine (NYC) are legislating what fats restaurants can and can’t use. Frankly, I’m against both of these initiatives and have already expressed my thoughts on the trans fat ban. As far as marketing to kids goes, banning it will not solve many of the issues critics would like to address and, in fact, could exacerbate the problems. For example, enlightened food marketers will undoubtedly bring to market more and more healthy products for kids. If you ban marketing to kids, these new products won’t stand a chance of getting kids interested in them. Marketing for Good is about gaining competitive advantage by creating products that are better than existing products. For example, food marketers than make products that are nutritious and delicious, without encouraging weight gain, will only be able to leverage these advantages if they have a full range of marketing channels at their disposal.
Short of making more nutritious products, food marketers can dabble in Marketing for Good with programs like General Mills’ “Spoonful of Stories.” Now in its fifth year, this program puts 5 million kids books in packages of Cheerios, and is linked with both the National Children’s Book Week (Nov. 13-19) and the non-profit foundation First Book. According to PromoXtra newsletter, “General Mills will donate a year’s worth of books to 50 reading programs across the U.S., 12 books per child in each program. A mail-in form on Cheerios boxes lets consumers donate money to pay for more books that will go to local programs, in donors’ own communities.” Sure they hope to sell more cereal. That’s fine by me. My kids ate Cheerios for breakfast for their first six years. Kudos to General Mills for this sizable commitment to children’s literacy. Am I sugar coating a serious issue here?