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Cartoon characters on kids' packs slammed by Which?
The use of cartoon characters on the packaging of products aimed at children has been slammed by Which?.
The consumer watchdog said in its 'Food Fables – the second sitting' report published today (16 July) that some companies, such as Kentucky Fried Chicken and Weetabix, had started to take a more responsible approach to marketing food products to children, but many are still reliant on competitions and cartoon characters on packaging for their promotions.
Which? criticised on-pack promotions from Haribo where children can join an exclusive Candy Club to receive free sweets, Kellogg's and Nestlé's use of cartoon characters in the marketing of less healthy cereals and Kraft's use of the Dairylea cow on its packaging, and said it would be more responsible to use these characters to promote healthier foods.
Which? chief policy adviser Sue Davies said: "We're not against treats and we're not against marketing, but we are against irresponsible company practices and hollow company commitments. You just have to walk around any supermarket to see the wealth of cartoon characters persuading children to pick the less healthy option."
The study also found nutritional labelling to be "inconsistent and inadequate".
Which? has consistently called for the traffic light system of labelling, which is colour-coded and based on values per 100g, and said the Guideline Daily Amounts (GDA) scheme, favoured by Tesco, had "major inconsistencies".
Some food companies listed values as a percentage of a five to ten-year-old child's GDA on sweets, while others gave the percentage of an adult's GDA.
The study also found some of the serving sizes "misleading", with some sweets labelled with percentage GDA for a single sweet rather than the whole bag, which was unlikely to reflect the amount usually eaten.
Packaging Federation chief executive Dick Searle said the use of cartoon characters on packaging was "all part of the marketing mix" and "generally speaking it should be the role of parents to monitor what their children eat, not food companies".
"Nutritional labelling is a bit of a minefield, but the more information it contains, the more useful it is. It's down to the Food Standards Agency to sort this out, not food companies or the packaging industry," he said.
What do you think about the findings of the Which? report - add your comments below.
Which?: consumer watchdog says it's not against treats
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Comments
Matt Whipp - 16 July 2008
Oh get over yourselves. Of course companies will use ideas that appeal to kids on products for kids. If you want to protect our fatty little darlings you need mandates on the contents, not the packaging.
Julie Elliott - 23 July 2008
Do none of these children have parents who take any interest in their well-being? Surely they can advise their offspring about eating cereals containing less sugar, salt and fat.
Des King - 23 July 2008
God help us; the Puritans are back and they're writing the script for Loony Tunes. I can remember when Which? was all about steering you towards the best value product. Now it's doling out advice on how it should be marketed. Who or what else should they draft in to help flog the sweet stuff? Follow this line of thought far enough and next thing you know, confectionery will be obliged to display graphics of obese five year-olds on the wrapper. The fact of the matter is whether it's got Cbeebies characters crawling all over it or comes in a matt grey pack, some children will eat more sweets than is good for them. I can't substantiate this and actually couldn't be bothered to try, but it's a fair bet that drafting in the Disney brigade isn't going to turn sprouts into an irresitable lure for kids cruising the veg counter. Packaging is the come-on, but consumerism is the main issue. Which? is part of that debate, and if truth be told - and no doubt with the best of intentions - has probably done plenty on its own account to encourage credit debt by extolling the virtues of a whole raft of products and gizmos that in the current climate might equally be said to add up to a financially 'less healthy option'.
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