Let me just say this right up front – my family, especially my husband and our 5 yo son, love Star Wars. In fact, I loved the new movie – Star Wars, The Force Awakens, so much that I’ve seen it twice already.
it’s really about images being used to get the attention of children which creates buying (or should I say nagging) power. To me, this shows the Dark Side Of The Force of processed food.
Yes, I understand Disney paid George Lucas around $4 billion to buy the rights to Star Wars. I understand Disney need to earn this money back then cover costs of making, marketing and distributing movies and merchandise to make a profit. But at what cost to the health of our children? This product has 15.4g of sugar in it – that’s 3.85 teaspoons. Yes I know some of this will be the natural sugar from lactose but much of it is added sugar too.
Should The Use Of Licensed Characters Be Allowed?
What are your thoughts? Should companies be able to use licensed characters on their packaging? The industry is currently self regulated in terms of how packaging is developed which means they can within reason, do what they like with imagery (words are a bit more regulated).
The food industry argues it’s a parent’s responsibility to decide what their children should eat. To some degree, I would say yes this is right, but how much easier would our job be if companies were not overtly advertising to our children via packaging and other means?
Should the government be stepping in to prevent this sort of overt marketing?
Here’s some information to help you ponder the question of should the use of licensed characters be allowed.
How Often Are Kids Eating These Foods?
These types of foods are termed as discretionary foods by medical, nutrition and health studies. Many parents call these sometimes foods. The 2011-2012 Australian Health Study reported 30-40% of a child’s (2 to 18) energy intake is from discretionary foods.
The Australian Healthy Study has this to say about Discretionary Foods – they are “foods and drinks not necessary to provide the nutrients the body needs, but that may add variety. However, many of these are high in saturated fats, sugars, salt and/or alcohol, and are therefore described as energy dense. They can be included sometimes in small amounts by those who are physically active, but are not a necessary part of the diet”.
Based on these figures from this study, and the fact that 27.4% of our children between 5 and 17 are overweight or obese, it would appear these discretionary foods are playing too much of a role in the diets of young children.
Do Licensed Characters Impact Children’s Thoughts?
Let’s just ask ourselves, would companies go from having Anna and Elsa from Frozen on their packets to having Darth Vadar and R2D2 if they thought it wouldn’t improve their sales? Changing packaging on a product is a manufacturing cost, so you know big business wouldn’t be doing it, unless they were guaranteed in making the money back with profit. I am sure if we could get our hands on a sales report, it would show a big spike in sales when packaging changes to reflect the latest Disney/Pixar characters.
A study in America looked at how children responding to the taste of food where there were licenced characters involved. The same product was given to the children but one packet had a licenced character on it, the other did not. Children believed the one with the character on it tasted better than the one without it.
The study concluded:
“branding food packages with licensed characters substantially influences young children’s taste preferences and snack selection and does so most strongly for energy-dense, nutrient-poor foods. These findings suggest that the use of licensed characters to advertise junk food to children should be restricted.”
In addition to this, the study also reported children picked up visual cues on packaging (eg. characters) and remembered them more than non visual cues such as the words. The more recognisable the character, the more of effective it is likely to be in promoting that product.
The cute or licensed characters on the front of packets is only one element of packaging. The colours, fonts and shapes/type of packaging (how it looks and the tactile experience) also play big roles in the packaging.
As a side note, our 5yo son was watching me write this today and kept wanting to scroll up and down to look at the pictures (yes, it was driving me nuts!). When he saw the popcorn, he said “Yum I love that!”. I asked how would you know, we don’t ever have it. He said, “I don’t know, I just would because it’s got Star Wars on it.” I’d say that packaging is pretty powerful eh?
Is It Just The Packaging That’s The Problem?
No, it goes much further than that.
It’s hardly a level playing field for us parents. What I mean is it’s not like we are just contending with the packets sitting on the supermarket shelf. There are so many ways marketers are influencing our kids about these foods. Here’s just some to name a few:
- adverts during popular TV shows or movies
- competitions
- promotions at the supermarkets
- discounts at the supermarkets
- bus shelter signage
- signage on buses
- product inclusion with other big brands – eg. McDonalds meals
- internet
- social media for older kids
- sponsoring of sports events
What You Can Do?
1. Talk to your kids about real food
2. Treats Help Your Kids Health
Shouldn’t a treat be something which helps our kids health, rather than potentially harming it?
By all means, allow your children to have these foods sometimes, but please try to stop referring to them as treats. Talk about real food – delicious in season fruits and vegetables as being a treat. Make homemade banana ice-cream (frozen banana in a blender) and serve it as a treat. Watermelon cut in a wedge with a stick in the bottom, then frozen – serve as a treat. Celery with Peanut Butter in the wedge – serve as a treat.
3. Talk To Your Kids About Advertising
4. Play Real Food, Pretend Food
5. Limit Screen Time
Further Reading
Here are few different reports you may like to read on this topic.