In the future about 60 years in the past, the comic Bert Lahr placed on a satan swimsuit, held up a potato chip and uttered a phrase that might develop into a food-marketing milestone: “Betcha can’t eat just one.”
Positioning meals as deliciously addictive, as Lay’s did in its sly TV business, turned promoting gold. Within the a long time that adopted, Oreos and freezer waffles (“L’eggo my Eggo!”) have been portrayed as so irresistible that individuals fought over them. A well-liked stoner film, “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle,” chronicled two buddies’ obsessions with fast-food sliders.
Craveability turned such a promoting level that Kellogg’s went all in and named a chocolate-filled cereal Krave. Excessive-end cooks weren’t immune. Christina Tosi, recognized for the hyper-sweet desserts at her Milk Bar retailers, named one in all them Crack Pie.
However we’re now within the Ozempic period. A category of recent medication that get rid of meals cravings, in addition to a contemporary physique of scientific studies, have targeted consideration on the connection between habit and meals. Extremely-processed meals, made with low cost industrial elements and potentially as addictive as tobacco or gambling, are rising as a nationwide concern.
What’s a meals marketer to do? Some who work in or research the nation’s $1 trillion food industry describe the second as not far more than a velocity bump. Food firms are nimble at browsing the cultural waves and discovering new methods to maintain prospects reaching for an additional serving to.