Jim Liebelt's Youth Culture Watch

Fast-Food Companies Spending More on Ads Aimed at Youth

*The following is excerpted from an online article posted on HealthDay.

The U.S. fast-food industry has boosted spending on ads targeting kids, especially Black and Hispanic youth, new research shows.

For the study, the researchers analyzed data on ad spending and TV ad exposure for 274 fast-food restaurants and found that annual spending hit $5 billion in 2019, up more than $400 million between 2012 and 2019.

"Fast-food consumption by children and teens has increased over the past decade, and fast-food advertising definitely plays a role in that rise," said study co-author Jennifer Harris. She is senior research advisor for marketing initiatives at the University of Connecticut's Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, in Hartford.

In 2019 alone, 2- to 5-year-olds saw an average of 830 fast-food TV ads; 6- to 11-year-olds saw 787 ads; and 12- to 17-year-olds saw 775 ads, her team reported.

Just 1% of the ads promoted healthy menu choices. The rest touted full-calorie menu items or the restaurants in general.

Only 10% of the ads kids saw appeared during children's TV programming, and fewer than 10% promoted kids' meals, the researchers found. Many ads touted mobile apps or websites for digital orders.

Ads on both Spanish-language and Black-targeted TV programming increased dramatically over the study period, the findings revealed. Fast-food ad spending on Spanish-language TV rose 33% between 2012 and 2019. In 2019, Black youth saw 75% more fast-food ads than white youth did, up from a 60% difference in 2012.

On both Spanish-language and Black-targeted TV programming, fast-food ads more often featured low-cost, large-portion menu items and meal deals versus other offerings. No healthy menu items at all were advertised on Spanish-language TV, according to the report.

The findings were published on the center's FACTS website. FACTS is an acronym for Food Advertising to Children and Teens Score.

Source: HealthDay
https://consumer.healthday.com/b-6-17-fast-food-companies-spending-more-money-on-ads-aimed-at-youth-2653321351.html

Cannabis Ads and Store Location Influence Youth Marijuana Use

*The following is excerpted from an online article posted on ScienceDaily.

Advertising and location of cannabis retailers influence adolescents' intentions to use marijuana, according to a new study in the Journal of Health Communication by Washington State University researchers.

Researchers conducted a survey of 13- to 17-year-olds in Washington State to find out how marijuana advertising and the location of marijuana retailers influence adolescents' intentions to use the drug. The researchers also asked participants about their outcome beliefs -- whether or not they thought using marijuana would be good for them personally and or socially.

Their research shows regular exposure to marijuana advertising on storefronts, billboards, retailer websites, and other locations increased the likelihood of adolescents using marijuana.

The location of retail stores also played a role but the results of the survey were mixed.

While the actual density of marijuana retailers in an area was not associated with adolescents' intentions to use, study participants who said they lived within five miles of a marijuana shop were more likely to report intentions to use the drug than those who perceived they lived farther away.

The results of the research team's study could have significant policy implications as states that have legalized recreational marijuana use grapple with ways to adhere to the drug's legal status while trying to prevent adolescent marijuana use.

For instance, most states with legalized marijuana restrict placing retailers and advertisements next to schools, but other locations, where adolescents live and spend a lot of their time, remain largely unregulated.

Source: ScienceDaily
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201008142132.htm

Teens Exposed to More Junk Food Ads Eat More Junk Food

*The following is excerpted from an online article posted on U.S. News & World Report.

The largest study of its kind found teens who were exposed to more junk food advertising consumed more unhealthy foods every week.

According to the largest study of its kind, people aged 11 to 19 who watched one extra advertisement per week about junk food, over the average of six, ate an additional 350 calories in foods high in salt, sugar and fat every week, adding up to 18,000 extra calories per year.

The study of 3,300 teens, titled Familiarity With Junk-Food Ads Linked with Obesity in Young People, was conducted by Cancer Research UK and is being presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Vienna from May 23 to 26. According to a press release, it is "the first to look at online TV viewing in such a systematic fashion, and adds to the growing evidence that TV and streaming adverts can influence young people's unhealthy diet."

Jyotsna Vohra, head of the Policy Research Centre for Cancer Prevention at Cancer Research UK, led the research. She said in the release that the key takeaway from the research is "junk food marketing is associated with obesity in young people of all ages, and we know that obesity is linked to at least 13 types of cancer."

In the United States, almost 38 percent of adults are obese and about 18.5 percent of kids under 19 years old are obese. Obesity leads to heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol, bone and joint problems and asthma.

Obesity has many complex causes, but previous research has shown links between junk and fast food advertising and rates of childhood obesity, according to the study. Consuming high-calorie drinks and foods, which are usually high in fats as well as salt and sugars, greatly increases a child's chances of becoming overweight or obese.

The average teen watches 21 hours of television with advertisements per week, with a little more than half viewed on streaming services, the study found. However, obese teens watched significantly more television --- approximately 26 hours, which is the equivalent to one extra advertisement per week.

The participants reported eating about 30 foods containing high levels of fats, sugars and salt per week, compared to only 16 portions of fruits or vegetables.

All the teens were able to remember a junk food or fast food advertisement they saw while watching TV, and 80 percent of the brands they were able to recall had at least one fast food product as their top product. Researchers also said that those from what they described as a "more deprived background" were more likely to recall such advertisements.

Researchers found that an increased sense of familiarity with the advertising was linked to an increase in consumption of the junk and fast foods, which led to higher weight, regardless of age and gender.

"The food industry wouldn't pump hundreds of millions into advertising their products by creating catchy adverts if it didn't get people to eat more," the authors said. "With today's teens spending more time in front of screens than any other activity apart from sleeping, curbing exposure to junk food ads on streaming platforms as well as TV will be key to helping teens make healthy diet choices and reducing obesity rates."

Source: U.S. News & World Report
https://www.usnews.com/news/health-care-news/articles/2018-05-22/study-teens-exposed-to-more-junk-food-ads-eat-more-junk-food

Sports Sponsorships Hawk Junk Food to Kids

*The following is excerpted from an online article posted on HealthDay.

Far from trying to keep kids fit and trim, America's biggest sports leagues are actually pushing junk food at them, a new study contends.

Multimillion dollar "sponsorships" forged between professional sports organizations -- like the National Football League -- and food companies often end up marketing high-calorie foods and sugary beverages to kids, researchers reported.

The researchers found that more than three-quarters of the foods promoted through such agreements were "unhealthy" -- including chips, cookies and sugary cereals.

And since children and teenagers are among the sports leagues' biggest fans, the pull of that marketing raises public health concerns, the study authors said. This is especially true given America's obesity epidemic.

"It's kind of ironic and paradoxical that sports organizations, which encourage physical activity, would be promoting junk food to kids," said Marie Bragg, the study's lead researcher.

Sports sponsorships are nothing new. Coca-Cola has sponsored every Olympic Games since 1928, said Bragg, an assistant professor of population health at NYU School of Medicine in New York City.

And it's no surprise, she said, that the big sports sponsors are makers of chips, candy and soda -- and not vegetable growers.

"Those are the corporations with the money," according to Bragg.

In 2011, for example, PepsiCo agreed to pay $90 million a year for a 10-year sponsorship with the NFL, Bragg's team pointed out in their report.

When a company gets billed as an "official sponsor" of a sports organization, it can use the group's logo on its products or website. Similarly, the sports partner promotes its corporate sponsors -- on its website, for instance.

That's in addition to traditional commercials and other ads that tout the partnership.

For the new study, the researches used Nielsen ratings to identify the 10 sports organizations most watched by U.S. kids aged 2 to 17 in 2015.

These organizations included the National Football League, the National Hockey League, the National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, NASCAR and Little League.

The researchers then dug into the corporate sponsors for each organization, and found that almost one-fifth were food and beverage brands, marketed by 18 companies. They were second only to automotive sponsors.

Bragg's team then analyzed 273 ads for those foods and beverages, including TV and YouTube commercials, and still images from websites.

Overall, 76 percent of foods were deemed unhealthy, and over half of beverages were sugar-sweetened. The culprit foods ranged from fast-food giant McDonald's and Papa John's pizza, to an array of chips, candy, cookies and sugar-laden breakfast cereals.

The NFL led the way, with the most young TV viewers and the most food and beverage sponsors. On YouTube, those sponsorship ads had been viewed more than 93 million times through 2016, the researchers said -- though it's not clear how many of those viewers were kids.

According to Bragg, a wealth of research shows that ads do influence eating habits.

So, she said, it's concerning that kids are seeing so many junk-food messages tied to the sports teams they watch and admire.

The reality is, the next Super Bowl will not be sponsored by carrots, Bragg said. But the food giants involved in sponsorships make a slew of products.

So, in theory, they could promote their healthier products, Bragg suggested.

Source: HealthDay
https://consumer.healthday.com/vitamins-and-nutrition-information-27/food-and-nutrition-news-316/sports-sponsorships-hawk-junk-food-to-kids-732321.html

Tween Girls Susceptible to Mobile Advertising

New research shows that female tweens are highly susceptible to mobile advertising.

Sixty-five percent of girls surveyed said they are likely to buy products and services straight from mobile ads if there is a means to do so. Of those, a whopping 80% of girls say they would buy a product or service right away, while the remaining 20% said they would wait for a special occasion.

Perhaps most disturbing to parents, 27% of respondents they would make their purchase with a credit card, while 48% said they would ask their parents for the necessary funds.

A full 22% of respondents said they always tap on ads they see in mobile apps -- regardless of whether they’re interested in the featured product or service. (A more modest 56% of girls said they reserve their taps for ads featuring products or services that actually interest them.)

The research was done by female tween-targeted mobile ad agency, MobiGirl Media. “The results show that most girls in this demographic do like advertising,” said Jennifer Noonan, MobiGirl Media cofounder, regarding the company’s target audience of 6-to-16-year-olds.

Also of note, the majority of female tweens (53%) said they share “cool” products or services with friends. Of those, 58% said they spread the word in person, while 42% share products and services via text and in-ad share buttons.

As for most desired categories, 48% of respondents favored fashion-related ads, followed by makeup products (21%); toys (12%), apps (11%); and books (8%).

Source: Mobile Marketing Daily
http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/201140/tween-girls-suseptible-to-mobile-advertising.html#axzz2Ub0COFY2

Girls Training Bras Are Out - Girls Lingerie is In

Brands like Victoria's Secret, Hot Topic, Urban Outfitters, and Justice are cashing in on the growing demand among middle school and high school girls for intimate apparel.

A decade ago girls had little choice in underwear; a training bra was often a plain garment bought at Target. No longer. “Sensuality and body image continues to be a message that young girls are seeing and are being exposed to in a much less controlled fashion perhaps than even 10, 12 years ago,” says Dan Stanek, executive vice president at consultancy Big Red Rooster. They’re aiming to imitate the lingerie styles worn by celebrities seen on the Web, he says.

Retailers are taking care to present the garments as cute vs. sexy, says Marcie Merriman, founder of consultancy PrimalGrowth. Still, the reality is that stores are “all going to say they’re targeting 18- to 22-year-olds, but the reality is you’re going to get the younger customer,” says Merriman.

Victoria’s Secret (part of Limited Brands) was among the first to tap the market, introducing Pink in 2004. The sub-brand is geared toward college girls, with logoed goods and brightly colored bras and panties. “When somebody’s 15 or 16 years old, what do they want to be?” Stuart Burgdoerfer, Limited Brands’ chief financial officer asked at a conference last month. “They want to be older, and they want to be cool like the girl in college, and that’s part of the magic of what we do at Pink.” Sales of lingerie for younger women are a $1.5 billion-a-year business for Victoria Secret's Pink line.

Source: Businessweek
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-02-28/forget-training-bras-dot-girls-are-buying-lingerie

 

Study: Underage Drinkers Look to Small Number of Alcohol Brands

Branding plays a much bigger role in the alcoholic beverages teens choose to drink than it does for adults, according to new research.

A study from Johns Hopkins University polled more than 1,000 underage drinkers between 13 and 20 about their alcohol consumption over the previous month, and found they favored a relatively small number of brands.

Leading the pack were Bud Light and Smirnoff Malt Beverages. About 28% of teens reported drinking Bud Light in the past month, and 17% had sipped Smirnoff Ice or one of the brand's other flavored malt drinks.

Budweiser and Smirnoff took the next highest spots as well: Nearly 15% of respondents had tried Budweiser beer, and nearly 13% reached for Smirnoff vodka. Coors Light, Jack Daniel's Bourbons, Corona Extra, Mike's, Captain Morgan Rums and Absolut Vodkas rounded out the rest of the top 10 brands.

It is significant that young drinkers reach for such a concentrated group of brands, study authors said. Eighteen alcohol brands account for 50% of the market share among underage drinkers, but 33 brands dominate half the market for drinkers of all ages.

"For the first time, we know what brands of alcoholic beverages underage youth in the U.S. are drinking," study author David Jernigan, Ph.D., director of the Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth at Johns Hopkins, said in a release. "Importantly, this report paves the way for subsequent studies to explore the association between exposure to alcohol advertising and marketing efforts and drinking behavior in young people."

Source: New York Daily News
http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/teen-drinkers-reach-bud-light-smirnoff-study-article-1.1261266

Most Mobile Apps for Kids Secretly Collect and Share Information

A study from the Federal Trade Commission has found that most mobile apps for kids are secretly collecting information from children including device IDs, phone numbers, locations, and other private information without their parents' knowledge or consent.

Nearly 60% of the mobile apps the FTC reviewed from the Google Play and Apple App stores transmitted the device ID. They also often shared that ID with an advertising network, analytics company or another third party. Of those 235 mobile apps, 14 also transmitted the location of the device and the phone number, the FTC found.

More than half of the apps also contained interactive features such as in-app purchases and advertising that were not disclosed to parents.

Yet only 20% of the apps disclosed any information about their privacy practices.

"While we think most companies have the best intentions when it comes protecting kids’ privacy, we haven’t seen any progress when it comes to making sure parents have the information they need to make informed choices about apps for their kids. In fact, our study shows that kids' apps siphon an alarming amount of information from mobile devices without disclosing this fact to parents," FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said in a written statement. "All of the companies in the mobile app space, especially the gatekeepers of the app stores, need to do a better job."

Source: Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-ftc-most-mobile-kids-apps-secretly-collect-and-share-information-20121207,0,1679873.story

U.S. Consumers Watched 38 Billion Web Videos in August

The most recent comScore data reports that an all-time high of 188 million U.S. consumers watched an estimated 38 billion Web videos in August.

Americans viewed 9.5 billion video ads last month, with each of the top four video ad properties delivering more than 1 billion ads each. Overall, video ads reached 54% of the total U.S. population an average of 58 times during the month.

Also worth noting, comScore found that the duration of the average online content video was 6.7 minutes, while the average online video ad was 0.4 minutes.

Video ads also accounted for 20% of all videos viewed last month, and 1.4% of all minutes spent viewing video online.

Source: MediaPost
http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/183467/august-us-consumers-watched-nearly-38-billion-w.html?edition=51449

Black Friday Backlash as Stores Add to Thanksgiving Hours

As stores up the ante with earlier holiday hours that creep into Thanksgiving night, Black Friday is turning into Black Thursday, and some shoppers and employees aren't happy about it.

Toys R Us said Monday that it will open at 9 p.m. on Thanksgiving, an hour earlier than last year and the earliest of any retailer so far this year. Walmart will open at 10 p.m., two hours ahead of last year's midnight opening. Other stores, including Target, Macy's, Best Buy and Kohl's, will open at midnight.

Anthony Hardwick, a cart attendant at a Target in Omaha, started a campaign to protest the decision to open at midnight, four hours earlier than last year. His petition, on Change.org, calls for Target to push its opening to 5 a.m. Friday. The petition had 62,000 signatures as of late Monday.

"With the midnight open, you're going to cut into a lot of people's family time because you have to rest up if you're going to be working overnight," says Hardwick, 29. He says he'll be in bed by 2 or 3 p.m on Thanksgiving.

ConsumerSearch.com found in a recent survey of 1,003 people that 87% felt retailers should stay closed on Thanksgiving. "There's definitely a family spirit around Thanksgiving that people don't really want to see adulterated," says Christine Frietchen, editor-in-chief of the site.

Source: USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/story/2011-11-14/black-friday-backlash/51205118/1