Although encouraging people to eat more nutritiously can promote better
health, most efforts by companies, health professionals, and even
parents are disappointingly ineffective. Consumer confusion has lead to
floundering sales for soy foods; embarrassing results for expensive
Five-a-Day for Better Health programs; and uneaten mountains of
vegetables at homes and in school cafeterias. Brian Wansink's Marketing
Nutrition focuses on why people eat the foods they do, and what can be
done to improve their nutrition.
Wansink argues that the true challenge in marketing nutrition lies in
leveraging new tools of consumer psychology (which he specifically
demonstrates) and by applying lessons from other products' failures and
successes. The same tools and insights that have helped make less
nutritious products popular also offer the best opportunity to
reintroduce a nutritious lifestyle. The key problem with marketing
nutrition remains, after all, marketing.