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Just say No
 It is that time again, I’m hungry and the cabinets are bare like old Mother Hubbard’s. It is time for me to go to the grocery store.
So I head off with my accomplice, my niece, and we are off like the ginger bread man headed in the wrong direction.
We arrive, and of course, like any other five year old child she asks for everything under the roof except for meat.
Apparently raw foods aren’t appealing to young children, that and the lobsters in the tank. But I digress. So we continue our excursion and I almost made a mistake. I started to head down the candy aisle and decided to keep on walking… just keep… walking, and just turn down the next aisle… because I can only say no to my favorite chocolate once and we will leave with half the candy aisle. But then I made an even BIGGER mistake. I walked right into the cereal aisle. It was too late. As I said “NNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOO” (image in slow motion) and tried to turn around, my niece had already spotted the Sugar Coated, Sugar Filled and Sugar Steroid Injected Cereals.
As this was going on I noticed my niece was different. She had an infrared target on her head and she was in some sort of crazed state of “must have cereal now”. It is 3PM and no where near breakfast time. Now I know we were not in Target, so I looked to see where it was coming from. And would you believe it came from the cereal boxes. Our children are walking targets even at the grocery store! They place cartoonish, colorful and child-like boxes, cans, and containers, at their eye level to pick up and place in the cart.
A lot of this “Brand Recognition “of the popular overpriced Breakfast Cereals are marketed to our children during what is deemed as the safe. Taking place right on our televisions and on internet safe websites produced by Disney, Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, and various other supposedly kid friendly networks. Statistics say that:
· The average American child sees 40,000 commercials annually on broadcast TV alone.
· 80% of TV commercials are for fast food, candy, cereal, and toys
· An average of one food commercial is shown every 5 minutes during Saturday morning cartoons.
· Kids 8-18 spend an average of 44.5 hours a week with media versus 8.75 hours exercising
Don’t follow the bread crumbs to an empty wallet or an unhealthy child, take the time to say no. No I will not buy the name brand because it is right in my face. But if “I just gotta have my pops” then I can reach for the ‘Corn Cadoodles’ because I have a choice and they taste exactly the same. Taking the time to be a “Smart Shopper” and not a “Brand Buyer” can Magically Lead to More Colorfully Green Paper in Your Wallet.
For Comments or Questions, please contact Mr. Wali at
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