2015 Evaluating snack food nutrition and marketing to youth Snack FACTS 2015 Evaluating snack food nutrition and marketing to youth Authors: Jennifer L. Harris, PhD, MBA Marlene B. Schwartz, PhD Catherine Shehan, MS Maia Hyary, MPA Julia Appel, BA Karen Haraghey, MBA Xun Li, PhD UConn Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity November 2015, revised January 2016 Acknowledgements We would like to thank the following people for their valuable assistance in collecting data and preparing the report: Frances Fleming-Milici Renee Gross Carol Hazen Shani Legore Megan LoDolce Aaron Plotke Thank you to our colleagues at the Rudd Center, especially Daniel Jones and Whitney Hubbard. We thank Cavich Creative, LLC for their assistance in preparing the report and Burness Communications for their invaluable communications support. Finally, we thank the leadership and staff at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, with special thanks to Mona Shah and the entire Childhood Obesity Team. Support for this project was provided by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Table of Contents List of Tables .....................................................................................4 Ranking Tables ....................................................................................5 List of Figures ...................................................................................5 Executive Summary ..............................................................................6 Introduction .....................................................................................13 Results ..........................................................................................16 Snack food market ................................................................................ 16 Snack food nutrition ..............................................................................20 Nutrition of advertised snacks . 20 Smart Snacks ...................................................................................24 Comparing CFBAI-approved and other advertised snacks versus Smart Snacks ..............................25 Nutrition content overview .........................................................................27 Traditional media advertising .......................................................................29 Advertising spending .............................................................................29 TV advertising to children and teens .................................................................36 Digital media marketing ...........................................................................44 Snack food company websites .....................................................................44 Display advertising on third-party websites ............................................................46 Marketing to Hispanic and black youth ...............................................................51 Advertising on Spanish-language TV .................................................................51 Marketing to black youth ..........................................................................56 Conclusions ....................................................................................61 Endnotes .......................................................................................65 Ranking Tables ..................................................................................67 Methods ........................................................................................94 Scope of the analysis .............................................................................94 Defining the snack food market .....................................................................95 Snack food nutrition ..............................................................................96 Nutrition content .................................................................................96 Nutrition quality .................................................................................96 Marketing practices ...............................................................................98 References...................................................................................... 102 Snack FACTS 3 Tables and Figures List of Tables Table 1. Advertised brands from companies with brands in multiple categories................................ 17 Table 2. Companies offering advertised brands in just one snack category ................................... 18 Table 3. Smart Snacks brands from companies with advertised snack brands ................................ 19 Table 4. Nutrition content of advertised snacks by category ...............................................21 Table 5. Nutritional quality of advertised snacks by category ..............................................21 Table 6. Nutrition content of CFBAI-approved snacks by category ..........................................23 Table 7. Nutritional quality of CFBAI-approved snacks by category..........................................23 Table 8. Nutrition content of Smart Snacks by category...................................................24 Table 9. Nutritional quality of Smart Snacks by category ..................................................24 Table 10. Comparison of Smart Snacks by company and category .........................................25 Table 11. Advertised brands that offered Smart Snacks products . 27 Table 12. Differences between Smart Snacks look-alike products and advertised products ......................28 Table 13. Advertising spending by brand size and category in 2014 and changes from 2010.....................33 Table 14. Brands with advertising spending increases of $10 million+ from 2010 to 2014 ........................34 Table 15. Brands with advertising spending decreases of $10 million+ from 2010 to 2014 .......................34 Table 16. TV ads viewed by preschoolers and children by category in 2010 and 2014 ..........................37 Table 17. TV ads viewed by teens and adults by category in 2010 and 2014 ..................................37 Table 18. Brands targeted to children on TV ...........................................................40 Table 19. Brands targeted to teens on TV .............................................................41 Table 20. Nutritional quality of top-10 brands advertised to children and/or teens ..............................42 Table 21. Websites with the highest compositions of child visitors...........................................44 Table 22. Websites with relatively high compositions of teen visitors.........................................45 Table 23. Children’s websites with the most snack food display ads.........................................48 Table 24. Brands with the most display ads on children’s websites in 2014 ...................................48 Table 25. Third-party social media and youth websites with the most snack food display ads in 2014 ..............49 Table 26. Brands with the most display ads on Facebook and YouTube in 2014 ...............................50 Table 27. Brands that advertised on Spanish-language TV in 2010 but not 2014 ...............................53 Table 28. Hispanic youth visitors to snack food websites .................................................55 Table 29. Black targeted ratios by category in 2010 and 2014 .............................................57 Table 30. Brands with the highest black targeted ratios in 2014 ............................................58 Table 31. Black youth exposure to snack food websites ..................................................59 Snack FACTS 4 Tables and Figures Ranking Tables 1. Nutritional content of advertised brands .............................................................68 2. Nutritional content of Smart Snacks ................................................................72 3. Advertising spending ........................................................................... 76 4. Television advertising exposure for children..........................................................81 5. Television advertising exposure for teens ............................................................85 6. Snack food website exposure.....................................................................89 7. Display advertising on youth websites ..............................................................90 8. Advertising on Spanish-language TV ...............................................................91 9. Television advertising exposure for black youth .......................................................92 List of Figures Figure 1. Median NPI score of advertised sweet and savory snacks by company ..............................22 Figure 2. Median NPI score of CFBAI-approved, other advertised, and Smart Snacks by category ................25 Figure 3. Comparison of NPI scores for advertised products and Smart Snacks by company and category .........26 Figure 4. Snack food advertising spending by category in 2010 and 2014 ...................................29 Figure 5. Snack food advertising spending by media type ................................................30 Figure 6. Proportion of advertising spending on snack food categories by medium ............................30 Figure 7. Total advertising spending by company in 2010 and 2014.........................................31 Figure 8. Spending by company and category in 2014...................................................32 Figure