What consumers should be careful of…
The fashion brand GAP has been promoted by many celebrities, and a couple of examples of these celebrities are:
Consumers should be aware that GAP used/uses child labor to make their clothes. Child labor threatens the brands image, and using celebrities to advertise their clothing doesn’t make up for the child’s life that is being wrecked. Employing cheap labor without proper auditing and investigation means that children will be used somewhere along the fashion chain. This is not what consumers want to hear, as they pull off fresh clothes from clean racks in stores, when they should really be thinking, “Why am I paying $30 for an embroidered smock top, when a child made it for such little cost. Is this top stained with a poor child’s sweat?” this is what consumers should be asking themselves.
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So before you buy something, think first, think about how much sweat has been shed to make the item, and think about the cost of making it. Consumers should be careful of getting ripped off.
Consumers should also be careful of; Indecent advertising; which is offensive advertising. Consumers were made angry, and disgusted when they viewed a KFC advertisement earlier last year.
“Rude KFC ad is okay says Watchdog”
“Food labeling – the truth about some ingredients in some so-called healthy foods?”
“Innocent has lost its innocence”
As the quirky smoothie maker aims to compete with the big soft drinks companies, outraged fans claim it is betraying its ethos.
Britain's favorite smoothie maker has high expectations to live up to. Riding a tide of consumer distaste for artificial ingredients, Innocent Drinks has been one of the marketing success stories of the decade with simple drinks based on crushed fruit. Armies of loyal customers mean it has grown fast and won awards for enterprise. But like many successful youngsters, growing up can bring compromises.
Online blogs are full of howls of protest from these loyal fans after the company announced plans to sell its drinks in McDonald's. In case that wasn't enough to raise an eyebrow, the people at Innocent, loved by parents for their commitment to keep preservatives, sugar and other "nasties" away from kids, are shoveling sugar into their newest product. The company has re-branded its Innocent Juicy Water product and launched This Water, a range of flavoured waters. The new business may be spun off if successful but for now Innocent is heavily involved.
And though six teaspoons of sugar go into every 420ml bottle, one wouldn't know it from reading the label, where the list of ingredients reads simply, "some sugar". Douglas Lamont, heading up the new range, insists that withholding the fact that sugar represents up to 10 per cent of each bottle is "not misleading”.
The company may also have to pull one of its advertising campaigns after Pepsi reported Innocent to the Advertising Standards Authority for misleading consumers with "nutritionally incorrect information". Innocent has presented its response to the ASA and awaits a verdict.
Innocent Drinks strongly refutes the claim and UK managing director Jamie Mitchell says he was "saddened" Pepsi felt it necessary to attack in such a way. He claims the campaign in question, which claimed you get "more of the good stuff" in a smoothie than in a glass of orange juice, was intended to educate rather than upset people.
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Overall Innocent have been misleading their customers, their products are labeled a lie, and this is because they do not show the correct nutritional information, for example; the juicy water label does not show how much sugar is inside the drink, and instead says “some sugar”. This is wrong as customers want to know what and how much “of something” they are consuming. Innocent isn’t very innocent after all.
“Advertising aimed at children – war toys or junk food or expensive presents – is this appropriate?”
“New rules of junk food advertising”
The manufacturers of fast food could find themselves being hit with new restrictions on advertising fast food, aimed at children.
In 2006, there were plans to ban junk-food adverts which are aimed at children. But these plans only cover TV and radio, and not internet or mobile phones.
Some fast food chains had taken action ahead of the announcement.
KFC is the latest chain to act, announcing that it will no longer give away free toys with meals.
Burger King decided, in early 2006, that they would axe TV advertising aimed at youngsters.
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KFCs advertisements are shown a lot during the evening on television, this way they are promoting their business, and also sucking children into eating junk-food. The advertisement which is most common is “KFC festive feast”.
“Kids influenced by junk food ads”
Television ads for junk food do encourage children to eat unhealthy, according to a report.
In 2003, researchers at the University of Strathclyde analyzed over 30,000 piece of research and found that TV ads are responsible for children eating too much, fat, sugar and salt.
Professor Gerard Hastings and colleagues at the university’s Centre for Social Marketing found that most ads for food targeted at children appeared on TV.
These are mainly for the so-called “big-four” products – breakfast cereals containing sugar, soft drinks, sweets, and other snacks.
However in the past 10 years there has also been a rapid rise in advertising by fast food chains, which often use the offer of free gifts to tempt youngsters.
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For example, both KFC and McDonalds are guilty of advertising foods, with toys to tempt young children.
By looking above, you can see that McDonalds promoted their “happy meals” with Disney toys, and these are obviously going to attract children, as most children get the meals because of the toys.
It is a good thing that KFC have stopped advertising toys with their meals, as this attracts children, and instead are advertising their food via family gatherings, e.g.; Christmas, birthdays, and family nights in. KFC adverts are shown at a certain time, for example, after 6pm in the evening.
“The consequences of tobacco and alcohol being promoted and sold to underage consumers”
Tobacco and alcohol being sold to underage consumers is against the law, this can result in the shop owner being prosecuted and sent to court, and the shop could even get closed down.
In 2005, Britain’s 6 major supermarkets had joined forces with the government to tackle the issues of underage drinking.
For example, if companies are not targeting young people, evidence shows that a large proportion of commercial messages and promotional activities, do actually reach underage audiences.
Parents and friends have a large impact on youth decision to drink, however research clearly indicated that alcohol advertising and marketing also have a significant effect by influencing youth, adults and attitude, and helps to create an environment that promotes underage drinking.
What did the government do about underage drinking?
On the 12th December 2007, the Home Office launched a campaign to put a halt to the alcohol being sold to the under 18s in England.
In June 2007, the government launched Safe, Sensible, Social setting out the next steps in the national alcohol strategy. For the first time this identified under-18 drinkers as one of the groups that cause the most harm to themselves, families and the community. The government has commissioned a review aimed at producing realistic information on drinking for young people and parents.
It is also pushing to reduce sales of alcohol to under-age drinkers and explore tougher penalties for those who buy alcohol for under-18s.
A lack of treatment for young people with serious alcohol problems has been highlighted and the government will look at linking alcohol treatment to youth rehabilitation orders.
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The age of buying cigarettes had been raised to 18. On 17th December, the government expected kids to find it harder to obtain the drug, tobacco. However kids are still being sold tobacco by their newsagents/some shops, and this should not happen, the sellers license should be revoked, and they should be prosecuted and banned from selling the drug.
The consequences of underage drinking and smoking for the underage consumers, and their parents:
When youngsters drink alcohol, there are consequences, such as; sexual assaults, drink driving that results in accidents, fighting in the street, and also poisoning to the body. When youngsters smoke tobacco, there are consequences such as; damaging your body, lung cancer. Parents will look bad; it will look as though they have not brought their children up properly. They will look like bad parents.
