“Food Value”: Cost to your Health or your Wallet? Requesting McDonalds and other establishments to decrease portion sizes, and offer healthier and smarter food choices in advertising. Tag Words: food marketing; calorie portions; food deals; food choices; restriction; obesity; American obesity; portion sizes; convenience; NYC Drink Ban; McDonalds; body signals about hunger Authors: Emily Nowlin, Natasha Kachikwu- Oweh with Julie M. Fagan Ph. D. Summary (EN) Our project issue pertains to the fast food chains and other restaurants offering super-sized drinks and unhealthy items on the value menus that are contributing to the obesity epidemic. Due to this marketing, people are not listening to their body’s signals regarding how hungry they truly are. Our project is aimed at doing at persuading the fast food chains to choose to offer good deals and market smaller, healthier portions so that Americans will follow suit to make good, healthy choices and portion sizes, thus allowing them to listen to their body’s signals to tell them how hungry they truly are. In order to help combat this over-consumption, we will write letters to the restaurant CEOs and persuade them to offer smaller, healthier options by showing them how their company can benefit from doing so. We will also write letters to the editor of Women’s Health magazine to encourage them to continue demonstrating the negative side of these large portions and how these restaurant CEOs are contributing negatively to nutrition and behavior. Video Link (NKO) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSBeyq09EfI Dinner for 1 or dinner for 2? (NKO) The value of a portion size has become an emerging area of conflict. Where once portion sizes use to be a smaller serving, now consumers are seeking to have double and even triple the amount of a regular serving. In order to help this issue, the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act was was instituted by the United states Food and Drug Administration in 1994 and also the Recommended Dietary Allowances in 1968 . Over the years as more ways of marketing foods were becoming prominent people sought to find ways of obtaining more of these foods. As television sets and radios become popular the rate of obesity become directly proportional. The correlation here shows that the marketing of more fast foods greatly affected the portion consumption of society. 1 To clearly show this correlation we see in Figure 1, how the Center for Disease Control is able to greatly show the evolution of the portion sizes from the 1950s to now while showing how the consumer has also evolved.1 In the 1950's the portions of fast foods were less and consumers were able to balance their weight gain. Presently the new norms for food sizes would be viewed as abnormal to consumers from the past. According to the info graph, consumers’ portions have been escalating and so have their weights. Figure 1: Center for Disease Control (CDC) Evolution of Portion Sizes Benefits of food portion control (NKO) The body is an intricate system with its own regulation mechanisms. If the body needs something it responds and sends a signal for more of that item and when it has excess it can put things away for storage. When the body gets begins storage, is where consumers can face possible difficulties. The over-consumption of all nutrients such as carbohydrates, proteins and fats, can lead to the storage of fat. 2 According to metabolic pathways, any of these macronutrients that the body does not digest and use are converted into new fats and eventually stored. Now we have excess of nutrients in the body, which can yield fat synthesis. Portion control can facilitate in the buildup of fat storage by aiming at the amounts that consumers directly ingest. It is very hard for the human mind to measure the proper sizes that are required for the average body and that is why restaurants are needed to help facilitate this plan. For this reason, the 2 Recommended Dietary Amounts (RDA) serve as a rubric to guide consumption. RDA values are usually not listed in most food places, but restaurants usually use terms such as “servings” to indicate how much of that item should be eaten. RDA values are slowly beginning to lose their significance in the American diet and food industry. These recommended portions are slowly deviating from the idea of nutrition and health causing a greater problem to emerge within the food industry. Where the Problem Stems From: The American Values: Monetary over Nutritional (EN) Value can be determined based on the factors that one considers to be of utmost importance. Americans primarily value two things: the freedom of choice and money. Both of these two factors are important but cause problems when we prioritize them together, before we prioritize the opportunity to live a long and healthy life for ourselves and for our families. For example, Americans are willing to do anything to save money and get a good deal, even when it hurts us in the long run. Therefore, we prematurely make decisions about the quality and quantity of food we consume for dinner, without carefully considering the harm we are doing to our bodies by sacrificing nutritional value. The marketing departments of fast food chains, restaurants, diners, etc. are fully aware of Americans need to feel like they are getting a good deal and they take full advantage of it. Companies like McDonalds have created “Extra Value Meals” and “Dollar Menus” to draw in a large clientele. They offer a “McDouble” hamburger for $1.00 which seems like a good deal. However, with that comes 19 grams of fat, including 8 grams of saturated fat which is 42% of the percent daily value based on a 2,000 calorie diet.3 McDonald’s also offers deals such as 2 for $3.00, knowing that Americans will see this deal, feel they are getting a good “bang for their buck”, or rather a good value, and they will act accordingly. However with this, Americans are purchasing twice the amount of food they may have originally planned on purchasing and while they are getting an increased quantity of product for their money, they are also getting a significant increase in caloric and fat intake. As demonstrated in the table below, for every extra ounce of soda that the consumer consumes, they are also getting an additional 9.6 calories and 2.6 grams of sugar.3 Figure 2: Table of Nutritional Facts for a McDonald’s Coca-Cola 3 Small Medium Large 3 (12 ounces) (21 ounces) (32 ounces) Calories 110 210 310 Grams of Sugar 29 58 86 Cost $1.00 $1.15 $1.30 Source: McDonalds.com: Nutrition Facts Companies such as McDonalds also do a great job advertising these “great” deals on unhealthy food options, which fool Americans to think they are getting a good value and thus play a psychological role in persuading Americans to stop by and place an order. McDonalds is fully benefitting from this, as their profits has been rising as the economy remains tough.4 Americans also walk away think they are getting a lot for their money. However, Americans can barely walk away with the obesity epidemic that results. Americans are distracted by a good deal and they give in to purchasing this unhealthy food. They are so distracted by getting a good deal because they primarily connect value and a deal to the monetary value as opposed to the nutritional value. Who is to blame? (NKO) Even though the problem can be identified, the question remains who is to blame and how can we fix it. When choosing the right selections consumers look at the palatability of the food, availability and the price. Marketers of restaurants are able to use all three of these characteristics and thrive on them to help satisfy consumers needs. Marketers aim to kill two birds with one stone and use customer satisfaction as a way to push out their products and simultaneously profit. If consumers are looking to get the most for their dollars, then they will in fact be attracted to promotional bargains. Majority of these promotional bargains exploit the recommended portion sizes but when choosing the cheapest food item this is usually the route that consumers will pick.5 Food media tactics have allowed the average consumer to be comfortable in their food selections by rewarding them with a system of disproportional meals. 1 In a study done at the School of Public Health in Minneapolis, the results of the experiment showed that the impact of a 50% price reduction on fresh fruits and vegetables encouraged students to purchase those items.5 Compared to the other items such as cookies and sodas, which stayed at regular price, the healthier items were purchased. Consumer eating choices are greatly impacted by the marketing of cheap prices no matter what the items may be. Here we see how the direct act of promoting foods at a cheaper price guided student consumers to purchase those items. From this it may be better to conclude that as consumers become comfortable with the foods they constantly eat, and the constant selling price of these foods their consumption of such foods will only increase. Simultaneously the portions which consumers ingest will skyrocket as well. 4 Result of the Issue The Obesity Epidemic (EN) Figure 3: Body Mass Index Scale according to WebMD Source: http://www.webmd.com/diet/calc-bmi-plus Consuming unnecessarily large portions is a problem from a nutritional perspective because it causes Americans to consume more calories and fat then they expend.