Nestlé – A Genius Company
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Food giant Nestlé just announced that next month they will finish their takeover of weight loss company Jenny Craig. The process had already started in 2006 and all that was left now was acquiring the company’s Australian operations.
Doesn’t sound newsworthy? Sit back and think about it for a moment: The same company manufacturing calorie bombs like Kit Kat, Milky Way and Babe Ruth is now also responsible for offers that promise you to lose “12 lbs for just $12“.
Essentially it’s the ultimate dream for any company: With the left hand you create a problem you sell a solution for with the right.
In a “position paper” (PDF), Nestlé writes that in their opinion “proper nutrition and adequate physical activity are integral to maintaining good health”.
Which must be why in the UK they offer free exercise and fitness activities for collecting enough “activity points” through buying Kit Kat bars, Smarties and other sweets.
Picture courtesy of Graeme Weatherston.
16 Comments
Now that’s what I call a marketing strategy ;D
Sometimes I feel I think too ethical 😉
I can’t call it genious, it’s just a trap for idiots.
Well, I think most people won’t even be aware of this unique relationship.
Not the first time it happens, and won’t be the last. Tamiflu is a really good example.
Oh yes, who can forget that? I just wonder if Roche came out of that looking good.
BTW, we haven’t heard a lot about H1N1 lately.
I just admire you. I cannot write an article like this! Nestle is a cruel company and what will they do to you????
They are making good money by selling European water in Japan where we have plenty of natural tasty water.
As a marketing strategy model, they are a really interesting company.
Yoko, thanks for the compliment! It sounds like a beaten expression, but just be yourself and write the way you feel like. There are six billion people on the planet and some will connect with your personal style of writing, while others can’t get along with the way I put things.
Wow. That’s…extremely smart.
Kudos to nestle for that 😀
Yep, in a way you have the admire their guts.
Hardly genius. Standard strategy. You all act surprised as if this doesn’t happen everyday. When you get a multinational food giant like Nestle expanding, it’s only a matter of time until products seem to ‘conflict’ on some level.
Of course, they will argue that the people consuming such sweet and chocolate products gaining the points for exercise and fitness activities (by definition, not free due to the inherent point cost) would be doing so anyway, so rather than this being an incentive actually contributes to alleviate the problem. Which I think is very true. I cannot think of anyone buying an extra kitkat to ‘get that point to do exercise’.
Companies such as Anheuser–Busch InBev will continue to bribe governments to allow continued widespread consumption, pharmaceutical companies will continue to produce symptom, companies will continue to make money by any means necessary so long as they do not fall out of public favour.
I can’t remember the name, but there was an innovative and remarkable engineer who in the early 20th century played the police and gangsters off against each other by selling faster boat designs to one, then the other, then improving the former, then improving the latter slightly more still and so on and so on. Solid strategy… so long as you aren’t found out.
Like proctor and gamble, nestle has their fingers in too many pies – you will likely consume a product of theirs daily without even noticing. Doesn’t make them evil by any means if different branches have conflicting interests though.
Do you therefore believe that this was just a coincidence?
The only thing I have an issue with is their whole “12 lbs for just $12.” They’re pretty much pretending to have the key to weight loss then sell you common knowledge that anyone can find for free. I mean, nobody is eating candy and thinking, “this is good for me!” It’s a choice that people make and if that’s how they want to live, then that’s on them. I just don’t like all of the deception that goes with regards to weight loss “secrets.”
Well, people are still looking for the miracle solution that will let them lose weight effortlessly. That any diet comes down to reducing calories some of those “brand new” and “revolutionary” products quietly leave out.
A major pizza chain in the US recently added something like 50% more cheese to their pizzas. Why? It was backed by American dairy farmers and the US Department of Agriculture! The market goes where the money is.
Personally, I love dark chocolate, but am disgusted at the quality of American candy bars. How can anyone eat those things?
Interestingly, the same brand of candy bar can taste quite different depending on where in the world you buy it. Products bought in the US tend to be sweeter than their European counterparts, for example.