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Thursday, January 31, 2008

Witz DOESN'T Pick: Snickers Advertising

This just occurred to me-- Snickers has the slogan, "Hungry? Grab a Snickers!" which seems acceptable until you actually think about it for two seconds. In fact, I think the only reason it works is because they're so casual about the whole thing. What they're legitimately saying to us is, "Are you in need of food? Here-- eat a friggin' candy bar!" That is the most base level of nutrition and a very high level of bad advice. Parents have their children taken away for feeding their kids like that. "Here, you little brat, eat this sugar!" That's not remotely acceptable eating behavior. If you are hungry, like genuinely hungry, your body is saying, "I lack nutrients required to fulfil my functions." The last thing you should do is tell your body to go to hell by stuffing caramel, chocolate, and nougat into your mouth. That's the fast train the Diabetic Land. Diabetic Land looks a lot like a back alley in a sketchy neighborhood, only all the needles are prescribed and people are passed out for natural reasons. So no, if you are hungry, don't grab a Snickers. I don't care if there are peanuts in it, too, Snickers is not the answer. Their other slogan, "Snickers Satisfies," is also really vague and misleading. It satisfies you momentarily in your quest for sugar and substance, but I can't believe they've gotten away with having athletes promote it for so long. At some point, when that stopped, scientists or doctors must have knocked on their door and just said, "You know what, we gotta be honest with you here..." and just shook their head, "No." Bad Snickers.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm going to play devil's advocate here: Snickers has among the highest protein contents for a candy bar and protein is pretty good for making you feel satiated in a way that's longer term than carbs, for instance. In fact, it has a lot of protein for how many calories it has, even compared to many non-candy bars snack items.

Granted, it's not the best thing out there for you and it does have plenty of empty calories as well.

JKow said...

Somewhat relevant and pretty interesting:

From a recent Tuesday Morning QB reader feedback article:

In a recent Jeffrey Larson of Denver adds this: "As a Ph.D. student in mathematics, I attempted to find the most nutritionally efficient way to eat at fast food restaurants. The goal was to purchase a day's worth of recommended nutrition (2,000 calories, 25 grams of fiber, 50 grams of protein) while keeping fat, sodium and cholesterol under FDA recommended amounts (which are 65 grams, 2,400 milligrams and 300 milligrams, respectively). For $12.27 at McDonalds, two regular burgers, two fruit and yogurt parfaits, one large fries, five apple slices with caramel dip, and one side salad without dressing provides an entire day's worth of nutrition without violating FDA guidelines. At Wendy's, $7.64 will purchase one Jr. Cheeseburger, one large fries, one bag of bag baked Lays, one plain baked potato, one sour cream and chives baked potato, and one small Frosty. This is the cheapest fast-food meal that provides all the nutritional requirements for an adult, though clearly, a daily multi-vitamin would be required."