Wednesday, October 7, 2020
Ever since I adopted a healthy approach back in 2017, I started looking more into the F&B industry. As a marketeer, unethical marketing practices that manipulate consumers' health and wellness are something that disturbs me to this day. Hence, and to help you with your health journey, I decided to give my articles another dimension and identify unethical marketing practices that could harm you. Be patient, it's a learning curve, enjoy the content! This is the first article on this aspect, sugar being one of the biggest enemies to our health. Many times, people find themselves gaining weight, and getting diabetes while assuming that they are not eating enough sugar. Unfortunately, most of the time, this goes wrong, and this article will tell you why this happens, so keep on reading!
The picture to the right shows 75 substitute names for sugar. Yes, you are reading right. 75 different terms to describe a similar sweet substance. Therefore, many F&B manufacturers label their products as 'sugar-free" or "no added sugars" while in reality, these products are full of sweet substances. Next time you run into a zero sugar product, check the ingredients list and if it includes any word which you don't understand, Google it up. It might very well be sugar...
Image source of the names of sugar
Another aspect of unethical marketing is shown in the junk food that targets children. This has contributed massively to the increase in obesity for kids and unhealthiness in addition to lack of well-being. For example, some products are usually attractive from their packaging perspective, like superheroes on the label. These items are also placed on shelves at kids' eyesight level at the point of sale, which makes them recognizable.
Consequently, whenever you go to the supermarket or to get groceries, please go the extra mile, check the ingredients list, and follow these basic rules:
- Any word in the ingredients list that you don't understand is either sugar or chemical additives,
- Whenever you notice a high shelve life, investigate ingredients further,
- Once you know your healthy products, making shopping for them a routine will be an underlying reflex. And one that your body will thank you for.
I will leave you with the below picture of sugar in our drinks for you to realize the importance of monitoring our sweet intake on a daily basis...
Carbonated drinks and sugar
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