Ronald McDonald targeted for contributing to childhood obesity

• Children's Health • • Obesity • Apr 02, 10

Just as lawmakers in Santa Clara County, Calif., are considering banning toys in kids’ quick-serve meals, a consumer watchdog organization is calling for McDonald’s to retire Ronald McDonald as its kids-marketing-oriented mascot. Corporate Accountability International has released a new report and national poll that finds that even though most Americans have a a positive impression of the iconic mascot, close to half think it’s time the company stop using him to target children.
The findings come amid growing concern over the QSR industry’s primary role in rise of childhood obesity and diet-related disease. The report, “Clowning With Kids’ Health,” analyzes how Ronald McDonald and other children’s marketing are at the heart of current trends.
The new poll was conducted by Lake Research Partners for Corporate Accountability International. Its findings include:

* Two out of three Americans have a favorable impression of Ronald McDonald
* More than half said they, “favor stopping corporations from using cartoons and other children’s characters to sell harmful products to children.”
* Forty-seven percent support retiring Ronald as a corporate mascot
* Among those with a favorable impression of Ronald McDonald, 46 percent support retiring him.

As the report points out, McDonald’s pioneered the practice of marketing to children; an initiative that has since spawned thousands of imitators, and afforded McDonald’s its long reign as the industry leader.
Various nutrition experts have called for QSRs to stop marketing to children. McDonald’s pledged in 2006 as part of Council of Better Business Bureaus’ self-regulatory Children’s Food and Beverage Initiative to limit its national advertising to children under age 12 to products that represent healthy food choices.
The Center for Science in the Public Interest released a report card earlier this month rating 128 company policies with regard to food marketing aimed at children, including many quick-service restaurants. The research found that most food and entertainment companies have either weak policies or fail to have any policies whatsoever. McDonald’s USA was given a C- for its efforts.

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Christa Hoyland