Usher - Honey Nut Cheerios, Twix; Macklemore - Cracker Jack, Dr. Pepper

June 7, 2016 5:01 PM

This Is How Much Celebrities Get Paid To Endorse Soda And Unhealthy Food FROM NPR: A new study published in the journal Pediatrics describes the lucrative endorsement deals of 65 music celebrities.

FROM Pediatrics: We identified 590 endorsements associated with 163 unique music celebrities in the sample. Consumer goods was the largest endorsement category (26%), followed by food and nonalcoholic beverages (18%) and retail (11%). We cataloged 107 food and beverage brand endorsements, although several brands appeared multiple times because multiple celebrities endorsed the brand. Overall, full-calorie soft drinks were the most commonly endorsed food or nonalcoholic beverage product.

posted by pjsky (46 comments total)

Pocket Like It's Hot deserves a revisit.
posted by drwicked at 5:10 PM on June 7, 2016 [8 favorites]

Can't wrap my head around Chris Brown being the one with the healthiest endorsements.
posted by weeyin at 5:12 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]

drwicked - how about We Will Rock You ?
posted by pjsky at 5:14 PM on June 7, 2016

Wait a minute... you mean that celebrities like money?

*gasps*
posted by jonmc at 5:15 PM on June 7, 2016 [3 favorites]

It took me a while to remember who Psy was so seeing an endorsement for Nongshim Shin Ramyun Black Cup seemed pretty random at first (I've only had the regular Shin Ramyun because Black Cup has actual beef extract in it and it is quite tasty but contains a lot of sodium).

I don't get how will.i.am can endorse Coca-Cola, Dr. Pepper and Pepsi. Doesn't he have to pick one?
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 5:20 PM on June 7, 2016 [7 favorites]

Wait a minute... you mean that celebrities like money?

*And will wiggle their asses to promote Grade B pigshit!*
posted by uraniumwilly at 5:42 PM on June 7, 2016 [2 favorites]

Rock and Roll died the day Microsoft paid the Stones to use "Start Me Up" for a Windows commercial, okay?
posted by oneswellfoop at 5:44 PM on June 7, 2016 [3 favorites]

I can't seem to find it online, but in the 80s (maybe early 90s?), Doonesbury had already pegged Rolling Stones as "elevator music."
posted by explosion at 5:50 PM on June 7, 2016

Do celebrity food endorsements actually make people more likely to buy a product?
posted by FallowKing at 6:11 PM on June 7, 2016

Do celebrity food endorsements actually make people more likely to buy a product?

Can't imagine Pepsi would pay Beyonce $50 million if it didn't come back to them in increased sales. In the article it states the author of the study "...didn't analyze how endorsements influence consumption, but she points to one anecdote that represents the potential influence of celebrities. It involves the rapper Pitbull's endorsement of Dr. Pepper.

"When Dr. Pepper asked Pitbull to endorse, they got 4.6 million advertising impressions, and sales went up 1.7 percent [among Latinos] — despite declining sales in the overall soft drink category," Bragg told us."
posted by pjsky at 6:23 PM on June 7, 2016 [3 favorites]

Do celebrity food endorsements actually make people more likely to buy a product?

In the 90s, I worked at McDonald's. I didn't even have a TV, but I knew that Michael Jordan had done a McDonald's commercial because suddenly every third customer was asking for the Jordan Burger. (This was not the McJordan that had been sold a few years earlier, this was some other burger just endorsed by him.)
posted by Hatashran at 6:26 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]

Rock and Roll died the day Microsoft paid the Stones to use "Start Me Up" for a Windows commercial, okay?

If that's the metric we're going by, then it died in 1963, when the Stones recorded a jingle for a Rice Krispies TV commercial.
posted by chambers at 6:40 PM on June 7, 2016 [6 favorites]

Music died the day that music was used to promote gramophones.
posted by turbid dahlia at 7:03 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]

PEOPLE BUY

MUSIC DIES

WHY NOT TRY

BURMA-SHAVE
posted by Doleful Creature at 7:31 PM on June 7, 2016 [27 favorites]

"Why, if they had offered ME that fifty million dollars, I'd have turned it down on principle!" is one of those things that sounds cool inside your head, but a little silly if you actually say it out loud...

A lot of music-industry celebrities are young, good-looking, utterly unqualified in any other respect, and have a career expectancy of about six weeks. And paying money for music is fast becoming a funny thing that people did in other historical periods, like wearing those stripy bathing suits.

I like Coke pretty well, and if somebody asked me what my favorite lethal gut-rotting soft drink was, I'd say 'Coke' for free. And if somebody offered me fifty million dollars to kill a hobo, I'd at least think about it for a minute...
posted by Sing Or Swim at 8:50 PM on June 7, 2016 [9 favorites]

I wonder how much people are paid to pose on Instagram with some shitty nutritional supplement. Didn't the one the Kardashians shilled end up being really really bad for you?
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 8:58 PM on June 7, 2016

I dunno what this even has to do with foot medicine anyway.
posted by turbid dahlia at 8:59 PM on June 7, 2016

Ah yes! Would YOU like to be branded? This is YOUR cHaNcE to be branded? Don't YOU want to be branded?
posted by Nanukthedog at 9:31 PM on June 7, 2016

Define "unhealthy". Sure, eating Doritos for 8 hours straight is probably a bad idea, but don't most people know that? I don't need food sheriffs.
From the piece, according to Marie Bragg:
"Though her study did not assess the link to dietary habits, she says, "we do know that exposure to food ads leads young people to overeat products that they see."

How does she know that? Do people really think, "oh I'm going to eat the same chips as Snoop Dogg" ?
Cam Newton can probably eat anything he wants--his job depends upon his speed and endurance.
posted by Ideefixe at 9:43 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]

I looked over the list of products and realized I could be bought for a fraction of what any of those people made and there is no way I'd feel guilty. The difference is that their careers consist of being pop culture public figures. Selling crap is what they do for a living. It all just seems like a nothingburger to me.
posted by 2N2222 at 10:44 PM on June 7, 2016 [1 favorite]

Macklemore endorsing Cracker Jacks, ahahaha? Are you mcfreaking kidding me?
posted by moonlight on vermont at 11:07 PM on June 7, 2016 [6 favorites]

NO COUNTRY

FOR SOLD MEN

BURMA-SHAVE


(I'll be here all week)
posted by Doleful Creature at 11:24 PM on June 7, 2016 [10 favorites]

"we do know that exposure to food ads leads young people to overeat products that they see."

There's no defence of these sordid efforts to get children to eat and drink more shit - which are even more heavily targeted to poorer countries with less regulation. The tobacco companies used to say that branding and advertising was about maintaining market share rather than increasing consumption, and nobody takes them seriously any more. In fact their marketing and branding is almost entirely banned. This follows the same track.

their careers consist of being pop culture public figures

... whom children look to for their choices in food and drink. With power comes responsibility?
posted by Coda Tronca at 11:51 PM on June 7, 2016 [4 favorites]

In threads about poverty we understand why some people make unhealthy food choices even though they're trying to do their best. In threads about obesity we understand how incredibly difficult it can be for some people to lose weight even if they want to because of food addiction and the dazzling array of "bad" foods which surround them in society. Then in threads about the people who are paid to push these products to kids and poor people and people with sugar addictions we say hell why shouldn't they, they'd be stupid not to take all the money Pepsi can throw at them, they can use it to hire chefs and nutritionists and personal trainers. Weird and gross.
posted by billiebee at 12:02 AM on June 8, 2016 [15 favorites]

I can't seem to find it online, but in the 80s (maybe early 90s?), Doonesbury had already pegged Rolling Stones as "elevator music."
posted by explosion

Right here.
posted by bryon at 12:15 AM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

I'm having a really hard time understanding what the story is here. Is it that celebrities are endorsing unhealthy foods? Celebrities also endorse alcohol, credit cards, cars, and medications that can seriously wreck your life if used incorrectly. Is it that celebrities are paid a lot to do these endorsements? Again, I don't see the issue here - if you're going to sell out, you go for what the market will pay. Advertisers wouldn't pay these sums if they didn't believe they would recoup it in sales.

If the issue is that it's unhealthy foods as opposed to healthy ones, and that unhealthy ones pay more, packaged goods are always going to have more money to spend than produce. Farmers aren't making PepsiCo money. Large farmers' associations can get together and pool their money to run a campaign (the Milk board is a pretty obvious example), but they're still unlikely to have both a national media budget and Beyonce dollars.

Female celebrities are generally better looking than the wider population - should this be including hand-wringing about how much they get paid for makeup and hair product endorsements?

This is one of those stories where I find the actual numbers interesting, but I don't get the outrage at all. It's like they're trying to shame celebrities into doing ads for healthy food? Sure, but those ads just don't exist.

They used to, though.
posted by Mchelly at 3:43 AM on June 8, 2016 [2 favorites]

Hang on a second - they count Psy's endorsement of pistachios in this list. Since when are nuts unhealthy?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:37 AM on June 8, 2016 [3 favorites]

Celebrities also endorse alcohol, credit cards, cars, and medications that can seriously wreck your life if used incorrectly.

Those are all aimed at adults. The issue is that Pepsi is aimed mainly at children. There are regulations about how you market to kids and these endorsements are designed to get round them.
posted by Coda Tronca at 5:26 AM on June 8, 2016 [3 favorites]

Is it that celebrities are paid a lot to do these endorsements? Again, I don't see the issue here - if you're going to sell out, you go for what the market will pay.

It's not that the problem is "oh my gosh a multi billion dollar company paid a multi millionaire SO MUCH MONEY!"

It' that a very influential person-especially for young people- is endorsing products that are unhealthy, and everyone is just shrugging it off as "duh rich people". There are several somethings going on that are mixing to create billionaires at the expense of poor americans and kids, and it's definitely worth the outrage.
posted by FirstMateKate at 5:30 AM on June 8, 2016 [4 favorites]

Those are all aimed at adults. The issue is that Pepsi is aimed mainly at children.

I don't think this is true. If you watch kids' tv programming, you don't see ads for Pepsi. There are toy ads and some unhealthy stuff like gogurts and lunchables, but not soda. The only ones on the FPP list I see that are targeted or aimed at kids are Pop Tarts and Honey Nut Cheerios. (I have a 7 year old so I've seen more than my share at this point).

Kids see ads aimed at adults, including for adult products. And that's worth a discussion. But saying kids like Pepsi, so Pepsi shouldn't use celebrities -- Just about every celebrity on earth has done a milk ad, and milk still isn't cool or flying off the shelves. An occasional soda isn't the problem - kids aren't buying all their household drinks. Parents buying it for the house and giving it to their kids every day is the problem.

Unhealthy foods taste good and give you a fat/sugar rush. They're also usually cheaper. People prefer them, and it's creating a health crisis. But I think blaming celebrity endorsements is a straw man.
posted by Mchelly at 6:51 AM on June 8, 2016 [2 favorites]

FNV is an interesting contrast to this -- it's a pilot program using celebrities to endorse fruits and vegetables and so far, results are good.
posted by kate blank at 6:56 AM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

If you watch kids' tv programming, you don't see ads for Pepsi.

Not allowed to in many territories. TFA is in a journal called Pediatrics. This is a childhood obesity conversation.
posted by Coda Tronca at 6:59 AM on June 8, 2016

I would have thought that the Beyonce ad was moving dollars from Coke and others to Pepsi if anything because it's aimed at people who are going to drink a soda anyway but then this made me think.

"A study published last year found that teens and young adults who reported enjoying hit songs that referenced brands of alcohol (think Kesha and her bottle of Jack) were more likely to drink compared with those who didn't like these songs."

There is so much lifestyle imitation with young people and it's probably very hard to determine how much influence these endorsements (paid or unpaid) have. Many kids will still choose a Coke and a burger over a juice and a bowl of vegetables because it just tastes better to them or the dopamine reaction tells them to. Some of them will surely choose one product over another because a celebrity did.

Music died the day that music was used to promote gramophones.

Music died the same day it was invented. Thak doesn't know what rhythm is, just that she likes banging two rocks together in a particular pattern. But Thak drinks Grog Brand Mead and so should you.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 7:48 AM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

Obligatory
posted by gottabefunky at 9:33 AM on June 8, 2016

it's probably very hard to determine how much influence these endorsements (paid or unpaid) have.

There are links in the article to academic studies, because it's kind of important rather than 'whatevs obesity', so some people are at least having a go.
posted by Coda Tronca at 9:50 AM on June 8, 2016 [2 favorites]

There are links in the article to academic studies, because it's kind of important rather than 'whatevs obesity', so some people are at least having a go.

Yeah, and I read those links and find them fascinating. I don't think it's 'whatevs obesity' at all. I wasn't saying there is no influence, but that there are so many moving pieces it's a hard thing to try to put statistics on. I'm glad people are trying to figure it out.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 10:32 AM on June 8, 2016

And the study linked suggests:
" In fact, research demonstrates that adolescents can be highly impulsive with purchases, in part because of peer pressure, fear of negative evaluation, and underdeveloped self-control systems."
So instead of pearl clutching about Pepsi, perhaps finding ways to help 12-18 year olds develop their own self control systems and how to avoid succumbing to peer pressure?
posted by Ideefixe at 10:32 AM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

It's 'pearl clutching' to expect some ethical standards and regulation about a corporation pulling in $63 billion a year, using every trick in the advertising book to evade regulation?

The laws against tobacco marketing have been part of maybe the most successful public health campaign ever. Would you have called it 'pearl clutching' to criticise Phillip Morris or BAT?
posted by Coda Tronca at 11:01 AM on June 8, 2016 [3 favorites]

"A study published last year found that teens and young adults who reported enjoying hit songs that referenced brands of alcohol (think Kesha and her bottle of Jack) were more likely to drink compared with those who didn't like these songs."

I started drinking Jack Daniels instead of Bacardi after going to a Murder City Devils show, so I can confirm that this study is correct.
posted by sideshow at 11:33 AM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

I started a three-bottle-a-day Elmer's habit after I got my first Ramones album.
posted by Strange Interlude at 12:11 PM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

I imagine people get paid to include certain brands in their lyrics, especially rappers, so are people like Future getting paid out by various fashion houses and cough syrup manufacturers?
posted by gucci mane at 12:29 PM on June 8, 2016

Fashion Killas: The Top Brands Mentioned In Rap Lyrics
posted by gucci mane at 12:32 PM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

"Why, if they had offered ME that fifty million dollars, I'd have turned it down on principle!" is one of those things that sounds cool inside your head, but a little silly if you actually say it out loud...

HIGGINS. Have you no morals, man?
DOOLITTLE [unabashed] Cant afford them, Governor. Neither could you if you was as poor as me.”

Rumor is Beyonce (exclusive of her husband) has a net worth of half a billion, most of it earned from concerts and other product delivery.
posted by IndigoJones at 12:32 PM on June 8, 2016

"A study published last year found that teens and young adults who reported enjoying hit songs that referenced brands of alcohol (think Kesha and her bottle of Jack) were more likely to drink compared with those who didn't like these songs."

Wait...isn't this literally saying that the cool kids drink?
posted by redsparkler at 1:53 PM on June 8, 2016 [1 favorite]

I started a three-bottle-a-day Elmer's habit after I got my first Ramones album

Carbona Not Glue
posted by rhizome at 4:21 PM on June 8, 2016

But I need my Taylor Swift + 100 kittens soda!

And seriously, that is exactly how to market to me. If I wasn't already a diehard Diet Coke drinker (though I don't see myself in Taylor Swift Keds, not my style, unless they attract kittens).

I'll buy anything endorsed by kitties.
posted by discopolo at 12:16 AM on June 9, 2016