Summary and Response Essay

                                         Fast food has become a big part of America’s culture and is consumed almost daily by Americans. In Eric Schlosser’s book Fast Food Nation he describes how big of a empire Fast Food chains have become. He gives an example by describing the “McDonald’s Plaza” and “Hamburger University”. Located in Oak Brook, Illinois this place teaches students proper McDonald’s language and McDonald’s culture. The plaza includes a “McStore” that sells everything that’s McDonald’s and also a Ray Kroc museum. Fast food is advertised as if it's not even food. Children are bombarded with commercials with a cheery jingle, sometimes animated characters and offered a toy with a purchase. The Fast food's companies secret to success is their aggressive marketing to children. But, are all the child advertisements justifiable and moral?

                               Ray Kroc has known Walt Disney since they were young; they’ve served in World War I together and also both moved to California for new business opportunities. Walt Disney gained his success earlier than Ray Kroc did. He was a professional at building his empire based on selling to children. When Kroc convinced the McDonald brothers to sell him the right to franchise McDonald’s globally, he emulated Disney’s marketing technique of selling to children because he knew they are a profitable and easy demographic to manipulate. I remember as a child all the countless McDonald’s commercials and they continue even going on regularly today. Kroc was very competitive; he was determined to be on top of the fast food industry. He described the business as “dog eat dog” and “the American way of survival of the fittest” he was aggressive to his competitors, mentioning that he was “going to kill them before they killed him” (Schlosser 37).

                              Kroc took to advertising to children following Disney’s success because he knew that a child who enjoyed watching a McDonald’s commercial would be inclined to eat there and he/she would have to bring his parents too. This method of advertising brought extra customers to the restaurant to bring their children. Schlosser mentions that in 1960 McDonald’s decided to sponsor Bozo’s Circus, a popular children’s television show at the time. This sponsorship attracted many new customers and proved to be very profitable. So when Bozo’s Circus was canceled McDonald’s took the initiative and created its own mascot and they came up with the instantly famous clown, Ronald McDonald. It's interesting how many children recognize Ronald McDonald at such a early age. After Ronald McDonald, the company created McDonaldland, an imaginary world with bright colors, playgrounds, friendly characters and food and all these elements combined turned children into the largest consumers of fast food.

                               Due to McDonald's and Disney's major success in targeting their advertisements to children, today most large companies aim their advertising at children. They hope that all the advertising at a young age will encourage future sales because of nostalgic adults. It has gotten to the point that today, on children’s TV channels there’s commercials for adult services such as car insurance with animated characters.  According to Schlosser "a persons brand loyalty may begin as early as the age of two" (Schlosser 43). Advertising to children successfully ensures more sales of the product because children persuade their parents to purchase whatever is being advertised for temporary satisfaction. All the commercials targeted at children is a subject of controversy. These advertisements prey on the children's immaturity and they easily become influenced by the television because they don't know any better. As fast food restaurants found out this was the way into kids hearts they mixed advertisement with popular children's TV shows and channels. I remember when I was young McDonald's had a huge promotion for Pokemon and Tamagotchi toys, these fads made children feel like they needed these toys. This associates one thing that the kids like with the advertised product making the positive feelings they get about the programming and the food synonymous.

                               In conclusion, I believe that the current manner that companies aggressively market their products towards children isn't right. I'm not saying that there should be absolutely any commercials towards a child demographic but, to the extent that it is done now it’s ridiculous. Today, children spend more time watching TV than anything else, their babysitter so to speak is the television and all they watch is children programming. Children's TV channels should solely be for kid entertainment purposes. Instead it's used to manipulate young minds at a very early age to be part of the hyper-consumerism society that the United States is obsessed with.