Teen Meat Consumption

Due to some negative messaging against meat consumption there has been a steady growth of young adults among others that have decided to cut all or most of their meat consumption

by Ronnie P. Cons

The negative messaging is often based upon inaccurate and emotional reporting concerning the welfare and treatment of farm animals as well as the perceived negative health effects of eating meat. As such it behooves the meat industry including the retail meat and poultry departments to develop effective counter messaging strategies to preserve and grow the teen market that will one day become the parents that make the bulk of the homes meat purchasing decisions.

“Protecting our future markets – a wise investment for the future!”

 

As the above mentioned negative messages are often emotionally based thus leading to emotionally and not rationally based decisions to cut or reduce meat consumption, the most effective counter strategy would be one that produces positive meat related emotions in teens before they are exposed to the above said messaging. As such, they will less likely be affected once exposed. Just like a vaccine.
Below are some strategies to evoke positive meat related emotions and meat eating behaviors among teens. We should first note that Bill S-228 – that may soon come into effect – limits advertising certain food and beverages to children under thirteen. This law will apparently ban advertising processed meat to this age category. As such, we will limit this article to strategies to target the teen market.

1) Make the meat and poultry departments more ‘teen friendly’ so that teens will actually enjoy being there with their parents as they shop. This can be done by placing fun meat eating posters with images of famous pop star and sports characters enjoying a nice meat meal. Sports cards depicting their favourite athletes eating meat can be handed out as well. The effect is a positive association with meat consumption.

2) The meat departments’ take out or fridge sections can offer teen sized boxed meat lunches in nice fun containers. The specially designed boxes can container one of several meal options including chicken salad or a hamburger in a bun. Include some fun meat produce quiz or game cards to evoke positive meat related feelings and many envious friends at school who will in turn ask their parents for the same.

3) The grocery chain can invest in producing some cool meat related cartoons strips with superhero characters that teens are into. These monthly produced cartoon strips can be distributed to the individual meat and poultry departments which will give them out to the teens. Superheroes such as “Protein man” and “Hamburger man” can be created associating their super strength and crime fighting abilities to their consumption of meat protein and other essential ingredients found in meat including Iron and Zinc.

4) The meat departments can organize a yearly sporting event for the teens such as a hockey game. The store sponsors the event and provides a nice meat meal at the local arena. This will help associate the store with health, fitness and fun. In addition the event will be long and favorably remembered by the teens once they become adults.

5) The grocery store chains can invest in web sites that contain meat related video games that are fun to play by teens. It can also display meat and poultry health facts and quizzes that explain the health benefits with regard to muscle strengthening, endurance and mental abilities.

The above messaging and positioning strategies will not only lead to increased meat and poultry consumption among teens but more importantly act to protect our future adult client base. Protecting our future markets – a wise investment for the future!

Ronnie P. Cons is CEO of C&C Packing Inc., a leading Canadian distributor of meat and poultry. He can be contacted at rcons@ccpacking.com