Dark Farming, Fired Food Damage, Back To school

Welcome to The Lempert Report LIVE

• A new thought on how to prevent obesity
• Farmers Go Dark
• It's Back to School shopping time
• Why you may want to stop typing – or dictating – and use a pen & paper again
• The damages from fried foods continue 
• On the Bullseye, a vodka brand stands out

Transcript

Phil: 0:04

Welcome to the Lempert Report LIVE. A new thought on how to prevent obesity, Farmers Go Dark, It’s Back to School shopping time, Why you may want to stop typing– or dictating– and use a pen& paper again, the damages from fried foods continue and on the Bullseye a vodka brand stands out. Let’s get started. So Sally, there's this new study that says you can prevent obesity in the grocery aisle by changing your packaging. Now, for years, you know, we've talked about how the color of packaging affects certain, you know, motivations for people, but what this report says, and this comes out of the Toronto metropolitan university and the Shanghai Jiao Tong University. What they're saying is the image size on the package itself, and they give an example of gummy bears and Pringles and so on, makes the larger the image, the more you want that product, what do you think?

Sally: 1:14

Well, I think that becomes an issue for those of us that, maybe trying to avoid junk foods that are heavily marketed to us. You know, these products are all competing for our attention in the supermarket, but we are in a country where 40% of our population is obese. And so this, this type of packaging is really frightening to me, if it is grabbing the attention of people and it's on junk foods.

Phil: 1:46

Yeah. And what they point out is the amount of junk food that we are eating is unbelievable here in the US. 58% of all food that we eat is processed. Their recommendation, something that you and I have talked about for years, is that consumers should read the entire nutrition label front and back to make the best informed decisions and not to be swayed by what the image on a package looks like. Red significantly increases of food perceived taste, green increases the food's perceived healthiness, but also it's important to understand is these things change. Red has not changed, but green.,. when I went to Prat and studied packages on, you would never use green on a food package, because that put in people's minds mold, that it went bad. You know, white meant healthiness meant more purity and yellow. And this study doesn't talk about yellow, but yellow actually makes the package look larger than a competitive product. So I guess the up shot of all this research and it's great, is that marketers need to understand this. You've got those marketers who want to understand it, to fool people, but also marketers have a responsibility, to really, you know, understand what motivates people. And what they're calling for in this research are regulations about the size of images that could be on a product. Now, when you pick up a food product, you'll see, you know, little words underneath the picture, you know, illustration or, you know, larger size to show detail, things like that. And they're saying, let's get rid of that stuff so that people don't want to eat those products. Like, you know, an oversized potato chip.

Sally: 3:57

Yeah. It sounds like something that could actually work. You know, it's interesting that you brought up the yellow. I did not know that. And it made me think of when I was a kid and all the generic brands in the supermarket were the big, you know, the big yellow box of cereal.

Phil: 4:13

Yup.

Sally: 4:13

Was a generic brand. And, so yeah, these are very interesting concepts that we don't even realize we're being influenced by when we're shopping.

Phil: 4:23

Yeah. Well, you know, you gotta go shopping when you're not hungry, when you're not in a good mood, when you're not in a bad mood, and now with your eyes closed. So another scientific study has come out that what they're saying is that food can grow in the dark. That it doesn't need the natural photosynthesis that takes place. And it can actually grow foods faster in the case of algae, four times faster in the case of yeast, 18 times faster, and it uses less physical space and energy than traditional agriculture does. And you know, now with climate change, with not being able to find labor to work on farms, this is really something that's very important, for the industry to pay attention to.

Sally: 5:19

Yes, this is so interesting, you know, they're calling it an artificial photosynthesis process. And so, you know, they're in instead of using the natural sun, they've come up with another process to capture acetate, which can be carbon. And apparently yes, it is more efficient. I was surprised to find out in reading about this, that only 1% of the sunlight is actually actually captured for carbon in crops. And so this is a great breakthrough, especially as you know, we're looking at our land space dwindling and, you know, farmers are trying to grow more food with less resources to deal with.

Phil: 6:05

Absolutely. And, you know, just being able to have a more controlled environment is critical. When we look at, you know, all the heat waves that we're having, we look at all the flooding, you know, everything that's going on, we've gotta move more indoor farming and be less reliant on mother nature. Also spending on school, clothes and supplies this year is gonna be a record of$37 million, according to the National Retail Federation, the average family with school age kids, like you and Tony, are gonna wind up spending$864 for school supplies. What do you think about that?

Sally: 6:50

That$864. That's a lot of money and I'm not sure, you know, that it says the average family, you know, that makes me wonder how many kids do you have? But just from my own experience, I have two children, one in middle school, one in elementary school, and we spent$250 on the school list supplies this year, but we spent, you know, an additional four or$500 on school clothes for the kids. So yeah, it makes sense when you look at that number and, you know, things are just so expensive. I also wonder about food. If more parents are going to be switching to school lunch, because it's getting more and more expensive to buy groceries and pack those lunches every day.

Phil: 7:37

Well, Walmart is doing, Walmart has noticed that, and they're the number one destination for back to school shopping. What they noticed is people went shopping for food and then they didn't have any more money. So they didn't go to the school supplies and the clothing and whatever else. So they have to keep on lowering prices for clothes and other non-necessities to get people out of the food aisle. Also there was somebody that they interviewed from Texas for this piece and brought up something real interesting that I had not thought about. You probably have, but because of the pandemic and kids, you know, studying from home or remotely or whatever else, they didn't have the extra cost of costumes, musical instruments, field trips, and so on. And now the kids are going back to school. They have those costs on top of it.

Sally: 8:36

Yes, it is true. And those things can add up throughout the year. What I would love to see, Phil, for these school supplies is, you know, I would've loved to have seen my local Kroger or Publix or the Target around here that's close to me actually take those local school supply lists and actually bundle those school supplies up for me so that I can go to the store. Say, here's the school my kid goes to and the grade that they're in and get a bundled package of their supplies at maybe a discounted rate.

Phil: 9:12

That's a great idea. And even if it's not in a discount, but the convenience of all that is fabulous. You don't have to wander up and down the aisles looking for stuff that might be outta stock.

Sally: 9:26

Absolutely.

Phil: 9:28

So another piece of research that comes out of the Kellogg school of management at Northwestern. Two professors there, uh, or one professor there and an associate professor of marketing at the school of management in Zhang university tested 2,500 people. And what they tested is what, what would have more of an impact if you were writing things down or you were doing it digitally or dictating? And what they found, for me was fascinating. And I'm one of these people who still have, you know, paper lists everyday that I go through to make sure that I don't forget anything. That what they're doing is, if you write it down, you make more virtuous decisions than those who used a digital device. For example, participants who read their options and made a selection on paper were significantly more likely to give m oney t o charity, choose a healthy entree and o pt for an educational book, rather than something more entertaining. And t heir research suggests that the key mechanism driving this effect is how real the decision really feels. What do you think?

Sally: 10:55

What a cool thing to research. I love this story and I think that the implications are really wonderful when it comes to our food for, let's say restaurants, you know, and I know a lot of restaurants are going to QR codes now. So you're scanning your phone and looking at the menu digitally, but you know, they talk about in this study specifically, like if you're looking at a paper menu in a restaurant, then you may be more likely to choose something healthy because yes, it is more real. It feels like more of a reflection of yourself.

Phil: 11:27

They also bring up something that's kind of scary. If you make a decision over zoom or on an online poll, it feels less real and thus less representative of who you are than an equivalent in-person interaction. And that could have major effects on how everybody's working remotely and on zoom and everything else.

Sally: 11:52

Yes. It could. Maybe we should follow your lead and we should all get the paper back out.

Phil: 11:57

Yeah. And last story is that another study that was presented last week at the 2022 Alzheimer's association international conference in Chicago. They followed over 10,000 Brazilians for up to 10 years. And what they found, which is really interesting is that eating ultra-processed foods for more than 20% of your daily calorie intake every day can set you on the road to cognitive decline. For men and women who ate the most ultra processed foods that a 28% faster rate of global cognitive design and a 25% faster rate of executive function decline compared with people who ate the least amount of overly processed foods. So, you know, just another indication of why we need to be reading those labels and looking for as close to nature as possible for our food supply.

Sally: 13:03

Absolutely. These ultra processed foods are typically very, very high in salt and sugar and fat, and they don't really contain whole foods. So we've gotta be really careful. Also though they may replace the calories that you would've gotten from good fibers, and good fiber is what helps keep your body healthy and balanced. So as you are aging, your body and your brain are aging in a healthy way. So, you know, maybe think twice before you eat the whole bag of chips.

Phil: 13:38

Yeah. And, not to put it on supermarkets, but their buyers need to read this stuff, need to understand it and just not load up their shelves with products that, you know, they would need themselves if they knew. So that's important. Well, our partners at the CMA and SEMA hosted a webinar with chase design, featuring a shopper survey that highlighted the bifurcation of categories purchased online versus in store. Let's hear what categories are most common by modality members of the CMA can access the full replay of the webinar in the resource library non-members can visit catman.global to contact the association about membership. Let's take a look.

Joe: 14:31

The other thing on top of that is look at these categories. These are the, these are the permanent categories that are not being shot online by a high percentage. You know, almost half of people will not buy meat and seafood online. Why cause they wanna touch and feel and see the cut of meat, same thing with produce, you know, so it's all the, and you look at this for a grocery store. These are the most profitable categories in the grocery store. So if people are putting on their list and their shopping list, the center store stuff, um, that's where they make the least amount of margin on top of that. Then they're adding these extra costs, hence why you see 22% equation going up. So it's really, it's, it's pulling itself apart to realize that people are realizing, oh my gosh, I'm spending this much more to actually have a nice to have versus I need to have

Phil: 15:20

On today's bullseye, we have a major shout out to Titos vodka for a brilliant PR and marketing stunt. Hey, we're talking about it, right? That've introduced Titos in a cam. It's a 16 ounce reusable steel can that sells online for 20 bucks with two standouts. When you buy one, the entire proceeds go to your choice of a nonprofit partner. That's cool. Second is that the can is empty. That's right. Empty. Watch this 32nd video.

Tito's: 15:50

There comes a time when every alcohol brand must ask, should we make a seltzer? And our answer is no introducing Titos in a can. It's literally an empty can that we're selling that's right. You add the Titos and the soda and the lime and whatever. Now you can drink your Titos from a double insulated, refillable, cold, hard can, and all these can drink in places we don't make seltzers. You do

Phil: 16:21

The brand is making fun of the hard seltzers and canned cocktail craze that we've reported on here before. Do I think that there's a lot of us that are gonna make our own canned cocktails and the Titos can not really, but what I do think is that this promotion highlights the fact that typically these SELs and cocktails don't use the spirits that their names allude to remember Bartles and James wine coolers that replace the wine. Once they were hit with Walt, they never called it a beer cooler and dropped the alcohol level to just 4%. And while they're still on the market, of course, now on a can, you'd be hard pressed to find it. Let's watch this category very carefully to see just what the future really holds. Thanks for joining us. Don't forget. Archives are at Supermarketguru.com and we'll be back here next Monday. Same time, same place, 11:30 Pacific, 2:30 Eastern. Have a great week.