Report: Junk food ads target black, Hispanic kids

Black and Hispanic children see TV ads for sugary, unhealthful snacks, sodas and fast food far more than for anything else, according to a report issued Tuesday by the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at the University of Connecticut.

“This study is an update to one that we did five years ago and what we were looking at was what companies were targeting black and Hispanic youth,” said Jennifer Harris, lead author and director of marketing initiatives at the Rudd Center.

“Pretty much not much has changed,” she said. “The companies are still targeting the worst products to black and Hispanic kids.”

According to the report, sugary drinks and foods, fast food and unhealthful snacks made up 86 percent of the ads on black-targeted TV programs and 82 percent of Spanish-language programs in 2017. Ten percent, or $1.1 billion, was spent on such ads.

The companies researched included Yum! Brands, which owns Pizza Hut and the fast-food chains KFC and Taco Bell, and which spent $12.8 million on TV stations most watched by African American youth. While that was only 4 percent of its ad budget, the study found that black youth were 2.24 times as likely to see Taco Bell ads as whites.

Domino’s Pizza, Burger King, Wendy’s, Arby’s and McDonald’s were all major targeters of African-American youths, with blacks almost 2.5 times more likely than whites to see a commercial for McDonald’s. Stations that tend to attract more young black viewers include BET and VH1, Harris said.

In packaged food and beverages, Hershey’s Jolly Rancher candies, with $1.56 million in spending, advertised to black youths 3.7 times more than to white youths.

McDonald’s is at the top of the list of companies advertising to Hispanic children and teenagers, with 10 percent of its TV ad budget, $57.78 million, on Spanish-language stations, followed by Subway, which is based in Milford, Wendy’s and Taco Bell.

Coke Classic spent the most on Spanish-language TV stations such as Telemundo, Univision, MTV tr3s and Discovery Familia, with $37.64 million, but General Mills spent 46 percent of its TV ad budget on those stations to promote Cheerios, Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Lucky Charms.

The report was also sponsored by The Council on Black Health at Drexel University and Salud America! at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio.

Harris said “we were a little bit surprised” by the findings because in the last five years food and beverage companies have begun “corporate responsibility initiatives or programs … about how they want to encourage healthy choices or health and wellness.”

She said Coca-Cola, for example, is “putting calories on the front of their products … but they’re still marketing their soda and sports drinks directly to kids. They’re not marketing their water.” Dasani water is a Coke brand.

Harris said it’s not clear why companies advertise unhealthful foods more to black and Hispanic children and teens. She said that company statements mention “their growth opportunity and the growing size of their population and larger families and that sort of thing.”

Part of the reason also may be that, while there was a drop in TV viewing from 2013 to 2017, the reduction was less for black and Hispanics than for whites. Harris said “a lot of viewing has gone to smartphones and streaming services” and “in lower-income households, they might not have the internet access or they might not have the smartphone” and may lack high-quality child care.

Poverty rates are higher among nonwhite households, according to the U.S. Census Bureau — as well as rates of obesity, diabetes and heart disease — are higher in nonwhite households

Yet, according to the Rudd report, the high amount of advertising to black and Hispanic children and teens “likely contributes to diet-related health disparities affecting communities of color, including obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.”

Harris called the marketing strategy “unfair because advertising works, so it’s really exacerbated the health disparities that are affecting those communities. … Hooking these kids on these unhealthy products now will harm their health in the long term.”

She said racial bias may also play a part in companies’ advertising choices. “It seems like they’re basing their marketing on an assumption that black and Hispanic kids only like junk food.”

The criteria used for inclusion in the Rudd study were companies that spent more than $100 million in advertising in 2017 or who belong to the Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative, a voluntary initiative administered by the Council of Better Business Bureaus in which companies pledge “that they will advertise only foods that meet CFBAI’s nutritional criteria in advertising to children under 12,” according to Maureen Enright, director of the initiative.

Both Harris and Enright said, however, that the initiative only applies to companies that advertise in media with an audience that is at least 35 percent made up of children under 12. Enright said BET and VH1 “are channels where children are a small percentage of the audience. … It’s not programming that’s intended for children.”

“Historically, regulation and self-regulation of advertising for children has focused on children under 12,” Enright said. In a report issued in December, “We found that companies are doing an excellent job of complying with their commitments,” she said. CocaCola, McDonald’s, Hershey and General Mills participate in the CFBAI.

In an emailed statement, Enright added, “CFBAI’s focus is ensuring that advertising by CFBAI participants to children under age 12 is for foods that meet strong nutrition standards, not how companies target their advertising budgets. We monitor child-directed programming, meaning programs that have an audience of 35% or more children under age 12, and have consistently found that participants’ ads meet our nutrition criteria. CFBAI participants do not advertise chips, candy and soda on kid’s programming.”