Youth Marketing Flame War!

by Jerry Ketel, Creative Director, Leopold Ketel & Partners
Joel Gunz, Copywriter/Creative Consultant, Gunz Communications
Originally appeared in Vox

A recent issue of Vox featured an Editor's Letter objecting to the FTC's plan to audit major food companies' youth marketing strategies with the intention of further regulating them. It stated that "public opinion is already doing what the government hopes to do," and that such actions may even be a waste of taxpayers' money. Jerry Ketel, Principal and Creative Director of Leopold Ketel and Partners, disagrees. What follows is an edited version of the email exchange. As a bonus, it contains a novel strategy to obtaining a job interview.

Joel,
The FTC should absolutely require food companies to disclose the marketing activities directed to youths. In fact, I have a hard time understanding why you are defending this industry practice without any public oversight. Obesity is the number one health problem in children today. Everywhere I go, I see chubby children snacking on fast fried food or sipping corn syrup fizz. It's no secret that marketers spend billions of dollars hustling packaged food directly to children -- precisely the audience who has the least willpower to resist such ubiquitous arm twisting.

According to the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale, businesses spent $15 billion marketing products to children in 2004 and were rewarded with $200 billion in sales. The overwhelming majority is for sugary breakfast cereals, fast food, soft drinks, snacks, and candy and gum.

This alone should be enough to have the voting public protesting in the streets. And yet, you seem to be more worried about the cost of a bag of chips. Who is more important here, the profits of multinational corporations or our children?

The US food industry wields enormous influence in this country. In the book, "The Politics of Food", author Marion Nestle chronicles the behind the scenes pressure this special interest group brandishes in Washington….

This is not an industry that needs to be shielded from the scrutiny of the public interest. If anything, its power and influence need to be subjected to the spotlight, especially if it means protecting the safety and well being of our children. If this means shelling out an extra 1/10 of a cent for a bottle of Coke, I'll gladly pay it.

--Jerry

Dear Jerry,
In 2004, the federally funded Children's Advertising Review Unit -- an arm of the Better Business Bureau -- published a set of principles by which marketers should regulate themselves in relation to their youth-targeted strategies. Its seventh point states: "Although many influences affect a child's personal and social development, it remains the prime responsibility of the parents to provide guidance for children. Advertisers should contribute to this parent-child relationship in a constructive manner." (Italics mine.)

Jerry, kids are more aware of their power of choice than ever. According to a recent Harris Interactive survey, kids are increasingly skeptical about what companies tell them. In fact, less than one kid in 10 between the ages of eight and 18 believes that marketers tell them the truth, and more than half (57%) say they "often notice tricks companies use to get them to buy something." These facts are overturning the assumption that youths are innocent dupes who need federal protection from "arm-twisting" marketers.

The same principles of free market economics that enable Burger King to tout Whoppers to tweens also do a very good job of keeping those large corporations from perpetually overreaching. For instance, in their quest for elusive funding, during the 1990s, schools began responding to the marketing overtures of Coca Cola and Pepsi. Then came the public outcry against this scheme. In response, the Federal government took action with a wellness program curtailing the sales of junk food during school hours. The Beaverton School District is taking the lead in implementing these new laws. I cite this as an example of how democracy should work: The public spoke out. The government responded -- and took action to manage its own public school system.

Junk food has been around for a long time. And thanks to a deluge of news articles, books and documentaries, awareness of its ill effects has never been higher. And the market has responded. Just a few weeks ago, McDonald's joined nine major food and drink companies in vowing to promote more healthy foods and exercise in their child-oriented advertising. Last year, Kraft Foods said it would curb ads to young children for snack foods including Oreos and Kool-Aid. The food industry is correcting itself – and the government hasn't had to lift a finger or a tax dollar.

In this context, Jerry, the FTC's inquisition-like tactics appear superfluous and even draconian!
I don't believe in shielding industry from public scrutiny. From Enron to Kraft Foods, there are too many cases of abuse. And the enormous influence large corporations exert on government goes without saying. However, Tony the Tiger's influence on your family or mine cannot be regulated by even the most stringent laws. That part is up to us as parents. When I see an obese kid sitting on his butt with one hand in a bag of potato chips and the other twiddling an xBox controller, I don't ask, "Where is Uncle Sam?" I ask, "Where are Mom and Dad?"

Cheers,
Joel

Joel,
This is starting to sound like a classic debate between a New Age Libertarian and a New York Liberal. But before we digress into such a spectacle, I have chosen to dig a little deeper into the nature of the FTC request. Here's what I found. According to the independent NewsTarget, the FTC plans to ask only 50 major companies to report on their advertising and marketing practices directed to children. But what is interesting is this quote, "The information will be exempt from the Freedom of Information act, the FTC said, and all collected information will be kept confidential and will not identify specific company data on the report."

Joel, this FTC "regulation" is merely a one time effort to garner information from the food industry to access just how far 50 companies are marketing to children. It seems far less draconian than you presented in your editorial.

And now for the spectacle. Joel, you are a knee jerk, numb nuts, advertising whore who is defending our industry's worst practice, marketing to minors. Sure, everybody's doing it but I have to draw the line when it comes to pushing cigarettes, booze or unhealthy food on our children. It is wrong. Period. To ask how some of these companies are marketing to children should be part of an ongoing effort to educate parents and children on the dangers of unhealthy food. This is why the government exists, to provide social services that would not occur in the anarchy of the marketplace. To ask companies to police themselves, as you have suggested is like asking the wolves not to eat the sheep. It ain't gonna happen. And sure, kids are wary of being advertised to but they are also just as easy to be persuaded. You have kids! You know this! Tell me that your kids have never persuaded you to do something outside of your normal parental boundaries, like stopping at the McDonalds or buying Fruity Pebbles! It has happened, it does happen and guess what, we are just now realizing that we are creating a nation of unhealthy kids who will turn into a nation of unhealthy adults. The public is waking up to this realization and is creating a sea change, Joel. Wake up and smell the double tall, no whip, decaf with a splash of vanilla latte.

Regards,
Jerry

Hey Jerry -
I get the whole monster in the boardroom dilemma. Got it. Nevertheless, I invite you to join me in seeing the BIG PICTURE. Here's where I stand. Others (i.e. not us) have polluted this debate with ideological dogmatism on BOTH sides of the aisle. This climate of discourse has infected not only youth marketing, but also US Politics, the Israeli-Arab conflict and beyond. Such intellectual colonialism hinders efforts to make progress in any of these issues.

On another note, I'm not sure how you feel about bringing pro-business libertarians working into your agency, but what do you think of meeting one of these days? I've got a new portfolio. Want to see it?

Jg

Joel,
At the end of the day it all comes down to this. Being an advertising man, I feel I must hold our industry to the highest standards. There are far too many barbarians that would storm the gates of ethical standards in the name of shareholder profits. Therefore, I believe we must, as citizens, ask for accountability and oversight of public and private institutions who hold sway in our society. We, the advertising industry must ask ourselves to be watchdogs for the greater good. I believe in the notion of caveat emptor, let the buyer beware. But there is an even greater notion our society has been built on, e pluribus unum, from many, one.

Let me know when you want to come over. I'm pretty open next week.

JK