Sugar Cereals

Marketing to kids is a sticky ethical issue. Cereal companies especially receive many complaints, as their boxes are covered in games and many use cartoon characters as spokespeople. Both Post and General Mills use similar strategies in marketing their cereals.

First, the Post Pebbles line of cereals includes Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Pebbles, which have been around for decades, but has just grown to include Cupcake Pebbles and Marshmallow Pebbles. (source) With cupcakes featuring sprinkles and marshmallows, they are still counting on kids to have a sweet tooth.



The Flintstones characters are the cartoons used to sell this line of cereal, and kids can play an interactive game online, called Bedrock Dance Academy.

General Mills uses a similar strategy, with Trix the Rabbit, Lucky the Elf and Chef Wendall. The company also operates a very popular arcade game website for children, Millsberry.com.

When these companies market to kids, they are selling fun. But, if you look at the nutrition facts of the cereals (Pebbles nutrition), they are essentially selling sugar. And because most children do not understand the essentials of good nutrition, they are a prime target. They have no base nutrition knowledge, so really, they can have very little consumer responsibility.

However, this is where the the parent argument comes in. A parent should have the nutrition education to decide whether or not to purchase a sugar cereal for their child. But, if you've ever been down a grocery store aisle as a kid, it is definitely the most fun aisle. The colors, the characters...it's the best part of the entire trip. Imagine being the parent who has to put the Kashi cereal in the cart while your 7-year old is staring at Fred and Wilma Flintstone, eyes wide, or God-forbid, throwing a tantrum.

In conclusion, in the case of sugar cereals, responsibility does lie with the consumer, but many times that consumer is at the mercy of an embarrassing and tiring grocery store tantrum, and that sugar cereal makes it down the check-out conveyor belt.