Scenario
In many cases, food marketers don’t even try to sell products
for the health-conscious in low-income neighborhoods. Businesses
both big and small thus contribute to the cycle of poor nutrition
in the inner city. A spokesperson for Kraft General Foods said, “We
aren’t a miniature Health and Human Services Department. A company
doesn’t have a social obligation to instruct consumers on the best
way to handle their health.”
At the Friendly Pal supermarket in Brooklyn, the Continental
Baking delivery person puts up lots of Wonder Bread and two small
loaves of whole wheat and another two of light wheat. The
salesperson says, “Whole wheat is for the old people, light wheat
is for the skinny people, and all this white bread, it’s for the
fat people.” In low-income Bedford Stuyvesant, only 25 of 149 small
grocers carry low-fat milk. A store across the street from one of
Chicago’s low-income housing projects offers only two cartons of
low-fat milk and two cartons of skim. The store sells lots of
Snickers, Coke, and Frito Lay products, beer, and cigarettes.
In Harlem, Little Debbie’s cupcakes sell like hotcakes. One
Harlem storeowner tried stocking his store with fresh fruits and
vegetables and Del Monte fruit in light syrup. His peaches, grapes,
lettuce, and tomatoes were ignored. Now he sells just potatoes and
bananas.
Although African Americans suffer more from hypertension, for
which doctors prescribe low-salt diets, the Special Request line of
low-sodium soups from Campbell is hard to find in the inner city
where many African Americans live. Campbell soup says it is easier
to fish where the fish are and doesn’t try to promote its more
nutritious soup to inner-city people.
Many supermarket chains have abandoned inner cities and have
left the market to smaller stores that charge between 10 and 20%
more for the same food. This isn’t a rip-off of consumers as much
as a passing on of higher costs. Smaller stores simply can’t buy at
the same low prices as larger supermarkets can.
1. Major food companies and smaller grocery stores in the
inner city are applying the marketing concept as they learned it.
They are giving people what they want, as measured by store sales.
They are not making much of an effort to encourage people to buy
products that are more nutritious. Is this a problem as you see
it?
2. Food costs more in the inner city than it does in the more
affluent suburbs. Do marketers have any responsibility to change
the situation? If not, does the government have any responsibility,
or should people be free to buy, sell, and eat whatever they want
at whatever cost, with no interference from the outside?
3. Poor health costs all of us in higher medical bills and
lower productivity of the workforce. If major food companies will
not promote nutrition to poor people, should that function be taken
over by nonprofit organizations such as churches, schools, and the
government? What would you recommend?
4. Would you try to do anything different if you were a
grocery store owner? What would motivate you to try to sell items
that are more nutritious?