The Marketing Situation of Doritos (FTC Complaint)

NPLAN filed a complaint today with the FTC today alleging that Frito-Lay has engaged in deceptive marketing to teens by disguising Doritos ads as entertainment; by collecting and using kids’ personal information in violation of its own privacy policy and without adequate disclosure about the extent and purpose of the data collection; and by engaging in viral marketing in violation of the FTC’s endorsement guidelines. Learn more about the complaint here.

These videos, which detail the advertising strategies and goals, speak for themselves.

Related Situationist posts:

• Sarah Haskins on “Ladyfriend” Stereotypes,
• Selling Products With Sexism,
• Hey Dove! Talk to YOUR parent!,
• Social Networks
• Barbie Commercials Across the Decades and the Implications on Female Identity and Objectification,
• “Shades of Fairness and the Marketing of Prejudice,” 
• “The Marketing Situation of Children,”
• The Situation of Eating
• “Common Cause: Combating the Epidemics of Obesity and Evil,” and
  
• “Situational Obesity, or, Friends Don’t Let Friends Eat and Veg.”

For more on the situation of eating, see Situationist contributors Adam Benforado, Jon Hanson, and David Yosfion’s law review article Broken Scales: Obesity and Justice in America.  For a listing of numerous Situaitonist posts on the situational sources of obesity, click here.