Subway hypocrisy
(flickr tags: subway restaurant)
In the style of McDonalds’ Monopoly game, Subway is now offering the Scrabble game where customers can either win instantly or collect letters from stickers sold with the food and win prizes. What I find interesting is that the only way to play is by purchasing a 32 oz fountain drink.
Isn’t Subway all about eating healthy and managing your portions? On Subway’s nutrition page, you can find advice like “Trim down on portion sizes, compare food labels and choose lower calorie foods, and replace sodas, specialty coffee and fruit drinks with calorie-free alternatives like water and diet drinks.” In their commercials, they advertise their “Fresh Fit” meals, which substitute fatty snacks like chips and cookies for healthier ones like raisins and they encourage people to eat the 6-inch subs (with 6 grams of fat or less!). Jared, the spokesman for Subway, is presented as an inspiration to overweight people for his example of losing something like 200 lbs by eating at Subway (and regular exercise).
Why is it, then, that this latest promotion only applies to 32 oz fountain drinks? Even if you drink diet soda (following the advice above), the serving size is 8 oz — 1/4 of what you need to buy for a chance to win. That’s just the best case. I highly doubt that all people who buy a 32 oz soft drink will go for the diet soda (and even that has no nutritional value). If you drink 32 oz of regular Coke, you would take in about 388 calories and 108 grams of sugar — that’s about 1/2 cup of sugar! So much for being healthy.
This seems like a really strange move for Subway. Their brand is about being healthy and this promotion goes completely against all advice for good nutrition. If they wanted to stay on message, they should have put the game stickers on raisins. This way they’re just encouraging bad eating habits.
