Marketing food safety: Maple Lodge Farms deli-meat edition
Maple Lodge Farms is often confused with Maple Leaf Foods, the latter of the listeria mess in Canada a year ago that killed 22 people.
In an effort to protect their brand, Maple Lodge has taken to marketing food safety. And I’m all for it.
These full-page advertisements are from a couple of Canadian magazines, the Sept. 2009 issue of Today’s Parent (right), and the Oct. 2009 issue of Canadian Living (below, left).
There’s far too many sick people, and far too much bureau-dancing around foodborne illness: The best food producers, processors, retailers and restaurants should go above and beyond minimal government and auditor standards and sell food safety solutions directly to the public. The best organizations will use their own people to demand ingredients from the best suppliers; use a mixture of encouragement and enforcement to foster a food safety culture; and use technology to be transparent -- whether it's live webcams in the facility or real-time test results on the website -- to help restore the shattered trust with the buying public.
Those companies that promote food safety culture can market their activities, and then consumers have a way to choose at the check-out aisle, providing feedback to those companies that make food safety a public priority.
Maple Lodge isn’t so much promoting a food safety culture as a technological fix. But at least they’re out there. A case could be made that the tomatoes, lettuce and sprouts pictured in these sandwiches also pose a significant food safety risk. That’s why buyers have to source food from safe sources.
Is that a Vegemite or an iSnack 2.0 sandwich, or are you just happy to see me?
In one of the most bizarre marketing decisions – ever, even for Australia – Kraft Foods decided to name its second generation Vegemite the iSnack 2.0.
I first heard the term Vegemite near the beginning of the worst decade of music ever, in the 1981 song, Down Under, by Men at Work.
Vegemite is made from leftover brewers' yeast extract, a by-product of beer manufacturing, and various vegetable and spice additives. The taste may be described as salty, slightly bitter, and malty - somewhat similar to the taste of beef bouillon. The texture is smooth and sticky, much like peanut butter.
Helen Razer, a Melbourne writer, says in today’s (tomorrow’s) The Age, that the chief element in Vegemite's new product is cream cheese. A secondary ingredient appears to be abject failure. No one likes the name of this new yeast product, except at least six Harvard MBAs at Kraft Foods who adore it.
The winning name was announced during the telecast of the AFL grand final. In an effort ''to align the new product with a younger market - and the 'cool' credentials of Apple's iPod and iPhone'' Kraft chose iSnack 2.0 from a field of 48,000.
This raises many questions. Chief among them is how very terrible were the other 47,999 competition submissions that Kraft was left with iSnack 2.0?
Razer says the label is every bit as hip as a polka convention and every bit as convincingly ''now'' as parachute pants.
Sounds like the wardrobe for a 1981 video shoot.
Razer also says, on Monday, the global noticeboard Twitter was jammed with disgust. Comments that included ''I said do you speaka my language? She just smiled and gave me an iSnack 2.0 sandwich'' and ''What's the matter, was the name Crap Paste already trademarked?''
Cold prevention kit nonsense
In the anything-to-make-a-buck category, it’s the cold & flu prevention kit: Kleenex, antimicrobial wipes, soap and some other stuff, all conveniently wrapped in additional plastic.
Gonzalo, a student who works with me, snapped this shot at a local supermarket last night.
Lamenting the end of food safety month
Playing the calm, cool Danny Glover to Doug's crazed Mel Gibson, I wanted to contribute to the food safety month discussion.
I’m not a fan of causes of the month; either an issue is important year-round or it’s not. Food safety month, established sometime in the mid-90s (thanks Google news archives), is supposed to be an awareness-raising time. The goal is to focus consumer food safety communication efforts and coordinate messages. But does this even work? 
Liz Redmond and Chris Griffith published research in 2006 that showed even targeted, specific social media messages (which isn’t really what is seen in the many food safety month press releases) may impact practices right after the audience is exposed to them, but behavior changes were not sustained 4-6 weeks after being exposed:
Results suggested that “one-off” food safety interventions developed and implemented using a social marketing approach may result in a short-term improvement of consumer food safety behaviors.
The unfortunate part about food safety month is that messages get recycled from previous years (sometimes with updated temperatures, sometimes not). It appears that contrary to CDC’s FoodNet report suggestions on enhanced measures, folks are just throwing the same messages year after year. The majority of messages focus on what consumers can do in their home, but few stories exist about what industry, regulators and researchers are doing to address food safety risks. If food safety is a farm-to-fork problem (kind of what HACCP is built on, addressing risks at different points) then our food safety messages need to be farm-to-fork.
Over a decade of food safety months and we've got the same annual estimate of foodborne illness incidents. If there’s no measurable impact, why bother?
Let's get rid of the one-off consumer-focused message blitz that is food safety month.
The best campaign idea I have for food safety month 2009 is a funeral of sorts. The campaign would be focused on lamenting the demise of food safety month and the birth of “Every month is food safety month”. We can have a New Orleans jazz-type funeral (because they really do them up right with the parade and all) with the cook, chill, clean, separate motto being pulled behind in an elaborate horse-drawn carriage. It will be a somber event for some, but others will rejoice in shedding the tactics that may result in only short-term behavioral changes. New messages and mediums are needed to really affect foodborne illness incidents.
Stickers source watermelons to California farm
The San Francisco Chronicle reports that at a farm in Manteca, in San Joaquin County, workers smack labels onto watermelons freshly cut from the vine, each sticker bearing a unique string of letters and numbers that identifies where they were harvested.
Ryan Van Groningen of Van Groningen & Sons Farms, which sells watermelons under the Yosemite Fresh brand, said,
"With food safety as big as it is, we can give each watermelon its own code so a consumer can check on the Internet to see where it is grown.”
This new code, called the HarvestMark, is being developed by the Redwood City startup YottaMark Inc. at a time when Congress is considering food-safety legislation that could make some type of tracking system mandatory.
In advance of any legal mandate, a few growers have started putting HarvestMark codes on products like plastic-packaged grapes and strawberries, as well as watermelons.
The idea is to enable a consumer to type the 16-digit tracking code into a locator field at HarvestMark.com to learn where the product was grown. Depending on the grower's records and what the farm chooses to reveal, the system could detail the date and part of the field where the product originated.
Great idea.
A decade ago, I advised the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers – whose cluster tomatoes still dominate supermarket shelves in Florida in the middle of summer – to do something similar, to market their food safety efforts directly to the concerned consumer.
For other produce producers, forget government babysitters and the non-niceties of offending other growers … growers who maybe aren’t so good at food safety.
Go further. Put a url on the sticker so concerned shoppers can check out a web site with video, not just about where a commodity was grown, but about food safety standards, and real-time test results for water quality and product sampling.
And then market it.
'Change culture to avoid E. coli'
Amy’s father and stepmom came for a visit and yesterday we went to a local eatery for a late lunch.
When Amy’s dad ordered a burger, the server asked how he would like the burger cooked.
He said medium-well.
The server said he could get the burger as rare as he wanted.
Amy said really, and started asking, just what was a medium-rare burger.
The server said it all had to do with color, and after some back and forth with the cooks, said the beef they get has nothing bad in it anyway.
Color is a lousy indicator.
During the same meal, a reporter called to ask, why do companies – big companies, huge chains and brand names -- knowingly follow or ignore bad safety practices? (that story should appear Sunday).
It comes down to culture – the food safety culture of a restaurant, a supermarket, a butcher shop, a government agency.
Culture encompasses the shared values, mores, customary practices, inherited traditions, and prevailing habits of communities. The culture of today’s food system (including its farms, food processing facilities, domestic and international distribution channels, retail outlets, restaurants, and domestic kitchens) is saturated with information but short on behavioral-change insights. Creating a culture of food safety requires application of the best science with the best management and communication systems, including compelling, rapid, relevant, reliable and repeated, multi-linguistic and culturally-sensitive messages.
Sixteen years after E. coli O157:H7 killed four and sickened hundreds who ate hamburgers at the Jack-in-the-Box chain, the challenge remains: how to get people to take food safety seriously?
Lots of companies do take food safety seriously and the bulk of American meals are microbiologically safe. But recent food safety failures have been so extravagant, so insidious and so continual that consumers must feel betrayed.
Frank Yiannas, the vice-president of food safety at Wal-Mart writes in his book, Food Safety Culture: Creating a Behavior-based Food Safety Management System, that an organization’s food safety systems need to be an integral part of its culture.
The other guru of food safety culture, Chris Griffith of the University of Wales, features prominently in the report by Professor Hugh Pennington into the 2005 E.coli outbreak in Wales that killed 5-year-old Mason Jones and sickened another 160 school kids.
Yesterday, the board of the U.K. Food Standards Agency (FSA), in response to Pennington’s report, approved a five-year plan that will push food businesses to adopt a food safety culture and comply with hygiene laws, and urge stricter punishments for those that do not. The FSA will also ensure health inspectors are better trained.
A report put before FSA board members in London stated “culture change in all of the relevant parts of the food supply chain” is necessary.
Mason Jones’ mum Sharon Mills said she is pleased with the action being taken by the FSA.
“This sounds promising and shows they are moving in the right direction. … Things are slowly changing and hopefully we will all see the benefits sooner rather than later.”
Maybe. I’m still not convinced FSA understands what culture is all about. And how will these changes be evaluated. Is there any evidence that social marketing is effective in creating food safety behavior change? Those issues get to the essence of food safety culture, yet are glossed over with a training session – more of the same.
And why wait for government. The best food producers, processors, retailers and restaurants should go above and beyond minimal government and auditor standards and sell food safety solutions directly to the public. The best organizations will use their own people to demand ingredients from the best suppliers; use a mixture of encouragement and enforcement to foster a food safety culture; and use technology to be transparent -- whether it's live webcams in the facility or real-time test results on the website -- to help restore the shattered trust with the buying public.
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How to greenwash food packaging; market food safety instead
Eat Me Daily is fast becoming one of my go-to sites. They write today:
This illustration by Lunchbreath is basically a checklist for corporate greenwashing: Earth tones, sans serif type, unbleached paper, and emotional messaging are essential components of the deceptive marketing techniques employed by corporations that rebrand their products.
We liked the customer benefit: "Be selfish while appearing progressive."
Market food safety instead. People are interested in not barfing.
Food safety culture and marketing go together
I’ve been writing and talking for a couple of years about the importance of food safety culture from farm-to-fork, and that companies should become more aggressive about marketing their food safety efforts.
Turns out, the two ideas can feed each other, in a synergistic manner (Chapman made the pic).
Those companies that promote food safety culture can market their activities, and then consumers have a way to choose at the check-out aisle, providing feedback to those companies that make food safety a public priority.
The sucess of perceived safety as seen in kosher foods
A recent survey by Mintel found that Americans choose to buy kosher foods because of perceptions of quality (62%), healthfulness (51%), and safety (34%) over religious reasons.
Similar trends have also been seen in the UK and Canada.
Krista Faron, a senior new product analyst at Mintel, was quoted by meatprocess.com as saying,
“Particularly in the recent past, Americans have been overwhelmed by food safety scares. People are very concerned and having some certification on the foods they buy can appease some of those fears.”
She also explained where many consumers find that comfort.
“The presence of the kosher mark itself suggests that there is [an inspection] process in place. It is all about consumer perception that there is some sort of formalized methodology...My sense is that consumers probably couldn’t tell us what kosher meant, but the kosher mark is reassuring,” she said.
While kosher processing meets certain religious standards, there is no scientific basis for the perception of heightened safety. Imagine, then, what the marketing of actual food safety measures within a company could do for business.
Since a Mintel report in December 2007, kosher has continued to be the number one individual claim for new American food products.
"Microbiologically safe" could blast it out of the water.
Market food safety so consumers can choose
The news this morning is full of features and editorials seeking to explain the shit storm of Salmonella produced by Peanut Corporation of America.
Chapman and I tried to take it a step further and focus on effective, long-term steps to reduce the incidence of foodborne illness from farm-to-fork. At this point in time, promoting food safety culture coupled with marketing and a series of carrots and sticks is the best we can come up with.
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In 1204 in Montpellier, France, a butcher selling a substitute meat in place of the advertized beast was required by statute to reimburse the customer twice the amount paid. In Narbonne, regulations dictated a whipping “with sheep tripe” in front of the food stall for unscrupulous sellers. China routinely executes its biggest food frauds.
During a hearing before the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee looking into a salmonella outbreak linked to a Georgia peanut processing plant, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont said Thursday that food producers responsible for widespread, deadly outbreaks of disease should face jail time, not just fines, to get food makers to take food safety seriously.
Sixteen years after E. coli O157:H7 killed four and sickened hundreds who ate hamburgers at the Jack-in-the-Box chain, the challenge remains: how to get people to take food safety seriously?
Lots of companies do take food safety seriously and the bulk of American meals are microbiologically safe. But recent food safety failures have been so extravagant, so insidious and so continual that consumers must feel betrayed.
The politicos in Washington are focused on legislative fixes, maybe creating a single-food inspection agency, maybe increasing inspections, insisting microbiological test results be submitted to government, maybe mandating jail time for the most audacious executives. Such moves may send a signal of hope and change, but will do little to reduce the carnage contaminated food and water wreak on the American public each year – 76 million illnesses and 5,000 deaths.
Industry – the folks that process peanuts and all those companies that make some of the 1,550 different peanut butter crackers, ice cream, energy bars and dog treats that have been recalled – is equally void of ideas. The system to ensure safe food relies largely on so-called third-party audits of suppliers, a system that glowingly approved Peanut Corporation of America and its leaky roof, filthy floors and rat-infested storage areas.
Other peanut butter manufacturers like Unilever and ConAgra Foods say they have “stringent food safety and quality control standards.” But neither will say what it is they do better than PCA; neither will say how often the plants test their finished product for foodborne illnesses or other contamination. Maple Leaf Foods in Canada, whose deli meats killed at least 20 Canadians last fall, says it has done 42,000 tests for listeria across 24 packaged meat plants in the past three months, but will not make the results publicly available for scrutiny.
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Even Whole Foods, where consumers pay a hefty premium for basic foodstuffs, said the company carefully checks the paperwork for all the products it sells, but can do no better than the minimal standard of government. “For the thousands of products we sell, that’s the extent we can go to. The rest of it is up to the F.D.A. and to the manufacturer.”
Like a fiscal house of cards, the Ponzi scheme of inspection and verification for food safety is collapsing with merely the mention of consumer scrutiny. Sort of like an eighth grade party with chaperones -- just pop and chips. But when the inspector or auditors leaves, the party turns exciting (read all about it on Facebook).
A cultural shift is required for everyone, from the farm through to the fork, to take food safety seriously. Frank Yiannas, the vice-president of food safety at Wal-Mart has taken an initial stab in his new book, Food Safety Culture: Creating a Behavior-based Food Safety Management System.
Yiannas says that an organization’s food safety systems need to be an integral part of its culture. At Peanut Corporation of America, former employees are now coming forward to tell of filthy conditions in the Blakely, Georgia, processing plant. A company with a strong food safety culture would have encouraged those employees to speak up while they were employed, not because the manager or auditor or inspector was watching, but because it was the right thing to do.
The best food producers, processors, retailers and restaurants should go above and beyond minimal government and auditor standards and sell food safety solutions directly to the public. The best organizations will use their own people to demand ingredients from the best suppliers; use a mixture of encouragement and enforcement to foster a food safety culture; and use technology to be transparent -- whether it's live webcams in the facility or real-time test results on the website -- to help restore the shattered trust with the buying public.
Here’s what consumers can do: at the local market, the stop-n-shop or the supermarket, ask someone, how do I know this food won’t make me barf? While such talk may be socially frowned upon, it’s time to put aside the niceties and bureau-speak and talk directly about safe food.
The more customers ask, the more food providers will be encouraged to market their food safety efforts.
Just like in 13th century France.
Doug Powell is an associate professor of food safety at Kansas State University and the publisher of barfblog.com. Ben Chapman is a food safety extension specialist at North Carolina State University.
Inspection and reality
I'm not a fan of focusing on food safety inspections or audits (and neither is Doug). Sometimes it gets us plunked into the does-not-play-well-with-others category. That's fine. Here's the deal: After playing hockey with government folks and talking to lots of inspectors I really like them. I like the idea of what they’re trying to accomplish (and I'll even try to set them up for open-net goals) but the whole concept of inspection as verification of actual food safety practices is flawed.
The theory behind inspection is that an operator (of a processing company, a restaurant, a church dinner, whatever) has a set of guidelines to follow to make and sell safe food. That part is fine. The inspector/auditor then comes in to tell them whether they are doing things right or not, and record that information. This is where it falls apart. That time the auditor/inspector spends in the facility represents an unrealistic snapshot of what actually happens. Even if multiple inspectors show up to a facility over a period of time to gather more snapshots, what they see will likely be different. The human factor, around risk identification varies. Some inspectors really know the laws and regulations and risk is black and white. Others see the gray areas. What's more important to the health and safety of customers is what happens when the inspectors, or auditors, or the boss, aren’t there.
A couple of years ago, Brae Surgeoner and I interviewed restaurant operators and environmental health officers about their views regarding restaurant inspection. Almost all of the operators suggested that inspection was a good thing, and that they had a good relationship with EHOs. And that’s when things got fun. Restaurant operators reported to us that what was being seen and recorded wasn't representative of what was really happening with every meal. They adjusted their personnel and their procedures so they looked good. It's kind of like an 8th grade house party with chaperones. Just pop and chips. But when the inspector leaves the party turns exciting. The best part of the study for us was that the inspectors reported the same thing: they felt they weren’t getting the full picture and knew everyone was on their best behavior while they were around (just like the parents).
So what’s to be done? The parents are part of it, but a block parent camped out checking that everyone's breath doesn't smell like peach schnapps isn’t the answer (because folks will find ways around it, like chewing lots of Juicy Fruit gum). The scare tactic of getting caught might work in the short term, but compelling operators to create a food safety culture, that will enhance their business is a better focus.
In this climate of uncertainty, it’s time for the really good peanut butter companies to step up, open their doors and show everyone how they prevent outbreaks of foodborne illness. Not their inspection or audit results, but a compelling story on how they identify and control risks. This is where the biggest return on all those food safety dollars might be seen, especially if the company can back it up and start marketing it to their customers.
Top 10 beer slogans: nothing to do with food safety, but the marketing slogans could be used
Everyone knows that beer is great. But sometimes the slogans used to sell it are even better.
10. Blatz - How Mother and Baby "Picked Up"
This advertisement actually says, "A case of Blatz Beer in your home means much to the young mother, and obviously baby participates in its benefits
9. Schlitz - The Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous
Being famous for Schlitz is up there with being famous for dandruff
8. Red Stripe - Hooray Beer!
After three or four brewskis the little man in your brain isn't thinking about problems at work, your mortgage payment or the fact that your wife doesn't find you attractive anymore. He's just dancing around in his boxers and yelling, "Hooray Beer!"
7. Mackeson Milk Stout - It looks good, it tastes good, and by golly it does you good.
6. Carlsberg - Probably the Best Beer in the World.
Hey, this beer might be the best one in the world. Or maybe it's not.
5. Courage Beer - It's What Your Right Arm Is For
God gave you two arms for a reason. Your right one is for shoveling Courage Beer into your face. And your left one is for everything else. (I'm pretty sure that's somewhere in the Bible.)
4. Miller High Life - The Champagne of Beers
Does it make sense to use another type of alcohol to try and sell your own brand of alcohol?
3. Pabst Blue Ribbon - This One Has The Touch!
I have an uncle who got a case of "the touch" after a case of Pabst. He's not allowed to come over for Thanksgiving anymore.
2. Colt 45 - It Works Every Time
Colt 45 wants to make it very clear. It will get you laid EVERY TIME you drink it. Not 1/3 of the time. Not 74% of the time. EVERY SINGLE TIME. Just ask Billy Dee Williams.
1. Schaefer - It's The One Beer To Have When You're Having More Than One
Kentucky Fried Chicken marketing food safety
I must have been in grade 11.
The object – no, not an object, the girl -- of my affection worked part-time at the local Kentucky Fried Chicken in Brantford, Ontario (that’s in Canada).
We’d meet after work, and ever since, the Colonel’s secret spices have held a special place.
In university and afterwards, I always seemed to live within smelling distance of the Kentucky version of deep-fried chicken thingies. And then there was the moving ritual: who hasn’t changed residences without a bucket of the Colonel and a case of beer to pay off the movers? (I’m thanking you, Marty)
It’s been a long time, but driving back from Des Moines Sunday morning with Amy, I was suddenly struck with the KFC urge. It was gross, although the corn-on-the-cob was as good as I remember when Chapman and I got a similar meal in upstate New York before crossing the border into Canada -- no corn-on-the-cob in Canadian KFC, at least not in 2003 – returning from a golf trip I was particularly grateful for.
And now KFC is marketing food safety.
Maybe they have been for a long time. I apparently only visit during nostalgia trips. But there it is, right there on the Colonel’s bucket: rigorously inspected; thoroughly cooked; quality assured.
Now, can I get that same assurance on the cole slaw – the cabbage-containg cole slaw that led to an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 in 1998 and again in 1999 at KFCs in Indiana and Ohio?
Marketing food safety: take control or the following (gross) images will proliferate
Found this on youtube. Apparently it’s a promotion for “growth hormone free beef” by NaturalMarket.com and won the 2006 Young Directors Award.
For everyone who says consumers need to be educated about things like growth hormones, or raw milk, or food safety, this is an example of the competing image. The video below is marketing food safety.
Retailers and manufacturers need to get beyond old-school thinking about food safety and start marketing directly to consumers.
Court says Tyson chicken antibiotic claims must stop
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A couple of judges have now agreed.Today, a federal appeals court in Baltimore refused to block an order barring Tyson Foods from advertising that its poultry products don't contain antibiotics thought to lead to drug resistance in humans.
The lower court ruling was a victory for rivals Perdue Farms and Sanderson Farms, who are suing to stop the advertisements. The two companies say the advertisements are misleading because none of the companies uses those types of drugs and shoppers could be led to think other companies use the drugs.
I continue to look forward to the day when food is marketed and advertised based on the lack of dangerous bugs that make people barf and shit.
Food safety applies to everyone -- not just that nasty industrial agriculture
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Judith Redmond, co-owner of Full Belly Farm in Yolo County, and president of the Community Alliance with Family Farmers, perpetuated a few leafy green myths in the Sacramento Bee yesterday.Redmond writes that,
"Much of California-grown "leafy greens," including spinach and lettuce, now go to the bagged salad mix market. This transformation from fresh to processed salads has created lucrative new and distant markets, but also has set the stage for heightened food safety concerns that do not exist with traditionally grown salad."
Dangerous microorganisms do not discriminate between lettuce and spinach bound for processing into a bag or shipped as is. Yes, processing can amplify problems once they exist, but control of microorganisms begins on the farm. Period.
Redmond says,
"Data provided by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and analyzed by the Community Alliance with Family Farmers show that since 1999, 98.5 percent of E. coli illnesses from leafy greens in California have been traced to processed, bagged salad."
I'd like to see how they came up with those numbers; publish it in a peer-reviewed journal. It's telling that whoever concocted this data ignored outbreaks before 1999 when bagged leafy greens weren't as widely available. Check out our table at: http://barfblog.foodsafety.ksu.edu/2007/09/articles/food-safety-communication/listeria-found-in-lettuce-at-central-florida-market/index.html
The listeria on fresh lettuce reported in Orlando Saturday was not bagged.
Redmond says,
"Our soil is full of life that wards off diseases and human pathogens."
I've heard this before, how organic soils are rich with microbial life that out-compete the bad bugs like E. coli O157:H7. I have seen no data to support this assertion.
Redmond says,
"… we must understand what it is about modern agricultural practices that has resulted in increasing problems with this super-bug, and what new interventions are needed to reduce its levels on our food and in the agricultural environment. This is likely to involve a hard look at industrialized cattle operations …."
And grass-fed cow-calf operations like the one linked to the 2006 spinach outbreak.
