Marketing Food to Children and Adolescents - Federal Trade ...

Marketing Food to Children and Adolescents
4. In-School Marketing
The Commission required the target companies to report all advertising or promotional
activities occurring in or around pre-schools and elementary, middle, and high schools. Several
companies provided copies of company policies that prohibited some types of marketing to
children in schools. 77 The Commission’s Special Order explained that in-school marketing
activities were reportable if they involved the use of trade names, logos, displays, signage, or
other branded materials in or around cafeterias, vending machines, or gymnasiums, at school
events, youth athletic events, athletic fields or areas, and on school buses or closed circuit
television channels.
Vending machines accessible to students, with logo placement, signs, and displays, were
the primary vehicle for promoting beverages, both carbonated and non-carbonated, to children
and adolescents 78 in elementary, middle, and high schools. 79 Beverage bottlers had vending
contracts with school districts or individual schools, and money paid to the schools pursuant to
these contracts was often designated for sponsored events, such as high school football games
and television recaps of games, after-school athletic programs, scholarships, or athletic apparel.
In other instances, use of the funds was wholly discretionary with the school or school district.
Some bottlers also provided free products to schools. One bottler sponsored contests directed
to children and teens, with information displayed on the vending machines and winning stickers
on or under caps of random bottles dispensed by the machines. Prizes – some of which could
be redeemed at the school principal’s office – included tickets to football games, autographed
footballs, licensed sports merchandise, fair tickets, ski passes, and T-shirts.
Both beverage and prepared foods companies, as well as one QSR, supplied school food
service departments with products to be sold in school cafeterias as part of school lunches.
Typically, these companies also provided promotional displays for their foods, such as posters,
banners, or ceiling danglers. One company tested a beverage product by providing samples in
middle and senior high school cafeterias. The company also distributed premiums – T-shirts,
hats, and key chains – in connection with another drink sold in cafeterias. A company selling
pizza and other entrees to school cafeterias (at all levels) sponsored a promotion in which
schools could receive branded merchandise for use by students, including soccer balls, kick
balls, Frisbees, backpacks, and notebooks, in exchange for placing the branded product names
on cafeteria menus. Certain of its brands also were tied to a cross-promotion for the film Nanny
McPhee; schools placing those brands on their cafeteria menus were entered into a contest to
win a private screening of the movie and also received movie posters, movie passes for a student
raffle, and other promotional materials. Mexican specialty food products were tied to a Cinco
de Mayo promotion through which schools could receive pedometers, as well as extra points
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