Stardate 20010810.1703 (Crew, this is the Captain): I just saw an ad on TV for a candy bar which has been vitamin fortified. The key scene was of a beautiful healthy (thin) woman taking a bite out of the candy bar and then smiling blissfully as captions swirled around the screen, being the names of various vitamins which she was consuming in this vitamin-fortified lump of sucrose. It was pretty pathetic, actually. The holy grail for candy manufacturers is to somehow convince the public that their candy is
good for you. It's commonly known that in excess candy will make you fat, and in the US (where this ad ran) being fat is generally considered to be undesirable. One way to help prevent that is to not eat candy very often, but that's just what the candy companies don't want. If they can somehow make it "part of this complete breakfast" then sales will rise. So occasionally one or another of them will make yet another attempt to make their confection seem to be healthy. So far it hasn't worked.
One time when I was in a shopping mall in Massachusetts I got accosted by a very cute young lady who invited me into a storefront to participate in a product test. Turned out it was for what eventually was marketed as the "Whatchamacallit" bar from Hershey, and they weren't testing the candy. They were trying out an advertising campaign. They did give me candy, but mostly what they wanted me to do was to look at a print advertisement which emphasized all the healthy ingredients which were included it it. Then I had to fill out a long questionnaire, which was an interesting experience. Someone really slaved over that questionaire, but it could have been summarized as the following two questions and answers: Does the ad say that this candy is healthy and good for you? Yes. I understand that that's what you want me to think. Do you believe it? Not even slightly. I never saw any attempt to advertise this particular kind of candy that way. Apparently I wasn't the only one who wasn't convinced. (discuss)
