The Story of McDonald's Health Halo

This is part two of yesterday’s Holy Chicken email.

I’m going to share, in my opinion, the second most interesting thing I learned from the documentary.

Nowadays, so many people are all about healthy, organic food. They want to get their food from Whole Foods or Trader Joe’s.

Of course, the fast food industry noticed this health shift too, and wanted to get a piece of that profit pie.

Take the infamous McDonald’s for example, they rebranded themselves from the place best known for cheap, fast food to a modern, progressive burger company. Part of that means to serve their customers healthier food.

So what did they do?

They started serving food with more greens and fruits.

They got rid of their styrofoam Big Mac container and started using cardboard.

Notice their architecture, their use of wood, and plants.

Also notice how they label their food.

100% real beef, freshly cracked egg, the use of the word ‘crispy’ rather than ‘fried,’ and the list goes on.

This is what’s known as the health halo.

Making changes to make the customers feel like they’re eating healthy (emphasis on the word feel), when in reality the food stayed the same as it was 10 years ago.

A famous quote I came across not too long ago summarizes this concept perfectly. Unfortunately, I don’t know who said this so I’m not able to give proper credit, but the quote is:

“Marketing is a game of perception.”

A nice power to have indeed. Like every other power, it can be used maliciously, like we’ve seen the so-called Internet Business Mentors do by making themselves look more wealthy, more successful than they actually are. And it can also be used to help people.