We do blast the commercials within "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution" but we have to allow leeway for those that advertise in the actual commercial breaks. After all, the revolution will be televised and food manufacturers want to jump on that bandwagon.
Special K Chocolatey Delight weighed in, marketing the product as a late-night snack after 9 pm. The concept is that you can get a chocolate fix with fewer calories. Well, fewer calories than what? A candy bar? Half a pint of chocolate ice cream? That isn't clear.
Then there is the question of the chocolate content in Special K Chocolatey Delight. The pieces look like chocolate.
chocolatey chunks (sugar, partially hydrogenated palm kernel oil, cocoa processed with alkali, cocoa, soy lecithin, artificial flavor, milk)
There is more sugar elsewhere as well as high-fructose corn syrup. You would be better off with a piece of dark chocolate: best of chocolate without so much sweet that can keep you up as you are trying to go to sleep.
Commercial placement is crucial as we have seen in the program. There is no coincidence that the Bing commercial appeared right after the Bing "commercial." But there was one intriguing placement of a food ad before the segment in question.
Angie Harmon, best known for her work on "Law & Order," did a milk ad with one of her daughters. Harmon is no stranger to endorsing milk – even chocolate milk – but this ad was just selling milk.
Harmon tied in motherhood and milk with this selling point about why milk is a family experience "because kids actually drink more milk when they see their moms drink it." Is this true? Have no idea, but it sounded good. And Harmon has that laid-back, relaxing voice that makes you wonder why she doesn't do more ads on TV.
The ad ran in the break before Jamie Oliver went to the seminar on flavored milk. The milk in the ad was white, and again while Harmon has promoted chocolate milk, what we saw on Tuesday night was non-flavored milk in the spot and the segment.
While this could be seen as tying in a little too closely, I would put in on the side of being "OK." Not crazy about the placement or the past association with chocolate milk, but love the mother-daughter tie-in and the fact that they are really mother-daughter, and the tone of the ad.
"Pour One More" is the slogan, trying to sell twice as much milk since mom is joining in, but then again, kids look for contradictions from their parents. And if mom is drinking non-flavored milk, kids have one less excuse not to do the same.
Perdue has a new USDA Process Verified product; the commercial was made to resemble a press conference. So the reporter asks what "USDA Process Verified" means. Jim Perdue explains that the chicken is cage-free with an all-vegetable diet with no animal by-products. Presumably, an all-vegetable diet means no animal by-products without having to say that.
The next reporter asks whether it's true that the chickens are not fed hormones or steroids. Of course, the answer is "Yes." There is the disclaimer below noting that federal regulations prohibit feeding chicken hormones or steroids. Promoting an element of your product isn't notable, if the absence of that element would be admitting to a federal crime on national TV.
There may be some element to USDA Process Verified, but given the department's contradictory agendas and Taco Bell's pride over its "USDA-inspected" beef, USDA isn't the best seal of approval.
Also on the food docket, there was an ad for Canada Dry where a young guy pulls a vending machine from the ground, as if the machine was a plant. The ad notes that Canada Dry has "real ginger, real taste." And fake high-fructose corn syrup. And Fage yogurt weighed in with a straightforward spot with the tagline, "Plain Extraordinary." The spot felt understated, an amusing surprise given the others' hype levels.
We fear the worst is yet to come, but maybe some have learned their lessons from last season.
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