Children's food campaigners complain about ads for 'manly' burgers

The Children's Food Campaign has complained to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) about Burger King's advertisements for the Double Whopper.  

Richard Watts, Coordinator of Sustain's Children's Food Campaign said: "One in three children is now obese or overweight.  Given this epidemic of childhood obesity, the last thing the country needs is for teenagers to be told it is 'manly' for them to eat these unhealthy burgers. Burger King's response to the obesity crisis seems to be to bury its head in the sand, and continue to produce larger and larger burgers.
 
He continued:  "This kind of advert shows the food industry cannot be trusted to regulate itself.  If the Government is serious about defusing the health timebomb of obesity, they need to end TV adverts for this kind of product before the 9pm watershed."
 
An adult male would have to walk about 9 miles (15 kilometres) to burn-off the energy supplied by a Double Whopper.
 

Ends

For more information please contact Richard Watts at the Children's Food Campaign on 0203 5596 777 or 07710 782719.

 

Downloads

Download the letter to Lord Borrie (65kb PDF)

 

Notes to Editors:

1. Burger King's recent UK sales have been hit by their failure to provide consumers with healthier options.  Their Chief Executive, John Chidsey, admitted that obesity fears were partly responsible for Burger King's sales slump. http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/investing-and-markets/article.html?in_article_id=414324&in_page_id=3
2. Burger King recently introduced the 'Triple Whopper with Cheese' into America, which, on its own, contains more saturated fat than the recommended daily amount for a man.  At the same time they introduced the 'Stacker Quad' (four burgers, four slices of cheese and four slices of bacon in a bap) marketed under the slogan: "Stack it high, tough guy".
3. Burger King's UK website provides the following nutritional information on their products:  The XL Double Whopper provides 841 KCal. of energy.  It also provides 50g of fat (men are recommended not to consume more than 95g a day) and 16g of saturated fat (men are recommended not to consume more than 30g a day).
4. The National Diet and Nutrition Survey found that:
   92% of children consume more saturated fat than is recommended
   86% consume too much sugar
   72% consume too much salt . 96% do not get enough fruit and vegetables.
   The Chief Medical Officer has compared the crisis in children's diets to a health 'time bomb' which must be defused.
5. The Children's Food Campaign wants to improve children's health and well-being through better food - and food teaching - in schools, and protecting children from junk food marketing.  We are supported by over 300 organisations, almost 300 MPs and 12,000 members of the public.  We were behind the ground-breaking Children's Food Bill introduced into Parliament last year.