Today I read that Kellogg's dropped Phelps as a spokesperson because his actions were "inconsistent" with their corporate image. That made me wonder, "what is the corporate image"?
Should we immediately think of salmonella and tainted cookies when we hear Kellogg? Because they have done massive food recalls at least twice already this year. One was today when it acknowledged the link between salmonella and "Keebler Soft Batch Homestyle Chocolate Chunk Cookies". Talk about "making a mistake" and "letting down their fans". Phelps seems consistent with corporate image here because he gets roasted for a DUI after one Olympics (2004) then roasted for pot after the next (2008). What part of that is unlike Kellogg's repeated circulation of food that will kill?
Truth be told, when I think of Kellogg's I think of childhood obesity first. I fully understand kids eat the worst kind of sugar laced breakfast every day because it is marketed by companies like Kellogg's. Not just a subtle kind of marketing but full-on, multi-million dollar mind freeze marketing. It's marketing presented with a slick message that has the illusion of so much authority that you would be insane to question it. The kind that makes families think that not having sugar cereal on the table is "weird" or wrong in some way.
When I talk of sugar cereal I am not just referring to Frosted Flakes either. Here is the product ingredient list for "Special K" that supposed diet and lifestyle cereal (check out the 3rd & 6th most prominent ingredients);
Ingredients: Contains rice, wheat gluten, sugar, defatted wheat germ, salt, high fructose corn syrup, dried whey, malt flavoring, calcium caseinate, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), alpha tocopherol acetate (vitamin E), reduced iron, niacinamide, pyridoxine hydrochloride (vitamin B6), riboflavin (vitamin B2), thiamin hydrochloride (vitamin B1), vitamin A palmitate, folic acid and vitamin B12. To maintain quality, BHT has been added to the packaging.
As nutrition expert Mike Reid says "if you can't pronounce it, don't eat it".
But, if you don't buy the link to childhood obesity with Kellogg's processed foods because you just think kids are not "active enough" then maybe it's time to do some research into childhood diabetes as well. What role does processed food-in-a-box have to do with the amazing jump in childhood diabetes in North America in this generation? That is too much food science and nutrition detail for me to go into with a water polo coach blog.
So, ya, you can say that an Olympian like Phelps is not anywhere close to the image of Kellogg's as a company, but it has nothing to do with his apparent use of cannabis.
Sorry if you were looking for technical information on water polo today. I decided to deal with the "athlete machine" side of the sport instead.
You know it's bad when high fructose corn syrup is one of the top ingredients as well as all of the other ingredients that you can't pronounce.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the agar streak plate they showed was disgusting. There are so many microorganisms on that plate. It kind of sends shivers down my spine thinking about it.
And childhood diabetes is becoming frighteningly dominant and has all sorts of social, psychological and biological factors involved in causing it and being caused by it. I'm not going to get into this as I can talk about it for a long time, instead I will save it for my seminar.