I want to share a letter I sent today to the man behind the newest Kraft Commercial. Kraft is using this new campaign to distract people’s attention away from the petroleum based artificial dyes they use in Mac & Cheese to hot sexy abs. Let’s not let them detract from the real issue at hand.
Watch the the latest Kraft Commercial Video HERE
Dear Anderson Davis, aka “The Zesty Guy”,
Hi, it’s Vani Hari aka the Food Babe here! From one babe to another, I’ve got something really important to ask you. I saw the recent Kraft commercial you are starring in, and boy was it hot! So it got me thinking. Kraft is one of the largest food companies here in the US, and it makes total sense why they would want your face on their brand especially after all the negative publicity they have experienced as of late with another babe, me. The reason why they want to change the conversation to your face and abs is because they don’t want Americans to know they are being exploited. Let me explain.
I recently discovered that several American brands are using harmful additives that are not used – and in some cases banned – in other countries. One of those products is an iconic staple that almost every American has had at one time or another: Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. Kraft Macaroni and Cheese in the US contains the artificial food dyes Yellow 5 and Yellow 6 made from petroleum, however Kraft reformulated this product in the U.K. using natural dyes, paprika and beta carotene when they found out these dyes were going to require a warning label.
These unnecessary – yet potentially harmful dyes are linked to hyperactivity in children, asthma, allergies, migraines and are contaminated with carcinogens (substances that cause cancer!).
The worst part, all of Kraft’s Mac & Cheese products marketed towards children contain these artificial dyes. I noticed you are a family man and have children. Would you let your child be pumped up with questionable petroleum-based ingredients and support a company that uses them here but not in other countries? How can we trust Kraft with our children? It is completely unfair to us that Kraft has reformulated the exact same product in other countries without petroleum. Don’t we deserve the same safer version our friends get overseas?
Well, you are not alone, actually over 280,000 people thought it was unfair too and last month signed a petition to ask Kraft to remove these dyes. Many of the people who signed the petition have either been affected by these dyes themselves or have had children who have experienced negative consequences. The letters I have personally received are heartbreaking.
After basically no response from Kraft (other than this letter to their fans), I decided to go to Chicago and deliver the signatures to their front door step on the same day they launched your new commercial (coincidence, I think not). Because of social media pressure, they eventually caved and let me in for a discussion, however all they did was just reiterate their position, and asked me to “agree to disagree” with them. Kraft does not put the safety of their consumers as their highest priority, rather it is their bottom line, and they confirmed this during my meeting with them.
Kraft obviously missed a huge opportunity to do the right thing, and now many concerned consumers are boycotting not only Mac & Cheese, but their entire line of products – including the dressing you are so famously known for now. So let’s talk about this dressing. Kraft Zesty Italian contains a couple of ingredients you should know about ASAP.
Vinegar, Water, Soybean Oil, Canola Oil, Sugar, Salt, Contains Less Than 2% of Garlic*, Garlic, Red Bell Peppers*, Onions*, Xanthan Gum, Spice, Oleoresin Paprika, Potassium Sorbate And Calcium Disodium Edta (to Protect Freshness). *Dried.
The ingredients in red above are likely all GMO (Genetically Modified Organisms). Oh you don’t know what GMOs are? Let me fill you in on that too.
GMOs are not sexy. They are ingredients that are made in a laboratory with seeds that have been injected with DNA from another plant, animal or virus. GMOs (Genetically Modified Organisms) threaten our entire farmland and there has been no long term testing on humans, even though they were sneaked into our food supply in the late 1990’s. Companies like Kraft don’t want you to know they are using them, in fact, they spent 2 million dolllars last year against the labeling of these GMOs. Over 64 countries label or regulate GMOs, but companies like Kraft are preventing that from happening here because they value their pocketbook over American’s health.
You used to play baseball right? Considering all of this, I find it hard for you to really want to be on the same team as Kraft – promoting not only GMO dressing, but supporting a company that is exploiting Americans for profit. I watched a couple of your recent interviews and you seem like a such a nice down to earth guy, so I hope you’ll consider this request.
I am asking you to end your relationship with Kraft until they listen to over 280,000 people who signed the petition to remove dyes from Mac & Cheese. It doesn’t help your image to be part of a dishonest, deceptive and hypocritical brand. To most people, it looks like you sold out for the bad guys, but I think this can be turned around pretty quickly and make you look like a hero. And besides, “The Hero Guy” will sound way cooler to your kids anyways.
You recently said on Twitter and Facebook, if you could do it all over again you’d be a country music star. It’s not too late for that either. I will even help you come up with a song to sing about the GMOs in Kraft dressing if you like. Continuing to be “The Zesty Guy” will only make you look like “The Sellout Guy”. It’s time to follow your true passion and dump Kraft.
I hope we can be friends one day, us babes need to stick together (but um… not like that, I have a husband for goodness sakes!).
I have faith that you will make the right decision, if you have the brains to match those good looks.
Love,
Food Babe
PLEASE TAKE ACTION AND SHARE THIS LETTER:
Help me and 280,000+ other voices get heard and tell “The Zesty Guy” to end his relationship with Kraft until Kraft removes artificial dyes from Mac & Cheese.Twitter: @andersondavis AND @thezestyguy – Click here to tweet to The Zesty Guy to #DumpKraft now (Don’t forget to use #DumpKraft in your message to him)
Facebook: facebook.com/andersondavisactor Click HERE to visit The Zesty Guy’s Facebook page and tell him what you think, perhaps you can educate him on the topic of artificial dyes and GMOs.
This is just too cute! Nice work.
Posted on his wall Vani, keep fighting for us!!
Posted on his wall! Thanks for your great work and dedication to exposing food crimes.
Love this! I can’t wait to hear his response!
“I will even help you come up with a song to sing about the GMOs in Kraft dressing if you like.” LOL!!! Food Babe, you are too much! 🙂
Wow! Food Babe nails it again!
How can we post your pics above on our FB page? Lets get more exposure . . .
You can save them to your computer but right clicking on the picture – Good Luck!
I just happened to find you while browsing.
Thank you for what your doing for our food supply.
I’m working on spreading the word for you and our children!
John
Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment John, glad my message had an impact on you.
Thanks Food Babe! I have pinned this for all of my mommy friends (who buy the groceries) to see and am going to tweet this dude. Petrochemicals in “food” and ingredients derived from faulty DNA are not sexy at all!
Is Kraft a mega company that owns many of our fAvorite organic brands? If so can anyone tell me which brands? I will boycott Kraft and Anything Kraft related!
Here you go Wanda. I don’t know if this is 100% complete though:
http://blog.static.consumerbell.com.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/buying_organic_chart.gif
Ha!! Love it!!
pictures worth a thousand words!
I am definitely against Kraft not removing the artificial colors in their Kraft dinner especially when it did for its products sold in other countries. However, although Kraft is not right for using these artificial colors you can’t bring GMO’s into the picture to try and make your cause better by making Kraft look even worse. Good luck finding a company that does not use GMO’s in any of its products. If you are so against GMO’s I hope you don’t eat any form of corn or wheat, as well as most variations of papayas and other fruits.
Also, did you know canola oil was originally made from mustard seed? They changed the recipe to a GMO seed because the mustard seed was proven to become carcinogenic once heated. Would you have preferred to use the “natural” non-GMO canola oil, or the GMO oil that shares many of the health benefits as olive oil?
Same as Olive Oil!!! I think not.
Canola oil is not mustard seed. It is rapeseed oil, which is a member of the mustard and cabbage family. was used for lubricating machinery. They changed its name to Canola to make it more palatable and started to feed it to us. It was first feed to pigs to fatten them up by destroying their thyroid and it is doing the same to us. Add the GMO factor, which makes Canola oil doubly dangerous for 1. foreign genes have been spliced into the rape seed genome (these could come from other plants, animals or viruses and bacteria) 2. GMO plants can take a lot of herbicides and pesticides without themselves being affected. Isn’t it good to know that you will be eating all that goodness when you consume a GMO products? Yummy. Also, once a plant (or animal) has been altered by playing around with its genes, it for all intents and purposes is no longer the same but a new creature. The effects of these GMO have NOT been tested on human health nor the environment.
Here are a few reasons GMO’s are made::
1) to remove an unwanted phenotype
2) to take a beneficial component from one organism to combine with another beneficial component of another organism
Canola oil is more suitable for frying than olive oil. It contains high levels of ALA (an omega 3) and is better for your heart than olive oil. For people who can’t afford virgin olive oil as it can be a bit pricey, canola oil is a nice alternative.
Here is some more information:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/food-and-wine/food-trends/why-canadians-should-soak-up-a-canola-oil-revolution/article594946/
Canola oil is a commonly used oil in Europe even though the European union has the most stringent GMO regulations in the world.
GMO use and production needs to be controlled so that companies can not abuse the use of them. But the fact is that many foods that are eaten in vast amounts by the western population (corn, wheat) are made from a GMO seed. At this point it’s pretty much unavoidable.
I tweeted and posted on his Facebook feeds regarding two posts. I told him:
DumpKraft Now! Your not an artificial person, why it artificial food?
Dump Kraft Now!! Eating artificial food isn’t good for the body!
And to think that just a few years ago that Kraft wanted to change food to make it healthier– what a lie.( I heard the story on NPR about 4 weeks ago)
It is a really great letter & I hope both he & Kraft change their minds. I can’t fight the impulse to point out though that (close to the beginning) it should say the commercials that you are “starring” in (and not staring). I’m sorry, but I just feel that since it’s a very public letter, you still have a chance to correct it.
We are all human and make typos – Thank you for the correction 🙂
Great letter! I hope it gets some attention! Did you post it on his FB page? I think you should! (In reality, of course, that guy was paid for his participation – and I bet you a million bucks he doesn’t eat their crappy GMO “food”!!!)
That was a fun to read letter. Also please note Food Babe there is ALWAYS some biotech spy in the comment section. Most everyone (I don’t care if they think GMOs are okay or not) cannot disagree with the fact that it needs to be LABELED.
American, Canadian, African, Asian, etc. need to FIGHT FOR LABELING and eventually BANNING.
You are so awesome!! Love this!
Great job!!!!!
Awesome work food babe! This is great.
I tweeted until my tweeter broke and I also shared a link to this article on his FB page. 🙂
Oh, those ads are just horrible.
I told ‘Mr. Zesty’ to be a hero and not a zero by dumping Kraft!
Good one!
Doubt he’s eating any of the crap Kraft sells …
You are a woman with a mission…. look out Kraft! I like the letter and your approach.
LOL. Thats awesome!!
“Yes, you are good looking AND no amount of good looks would get me to buy, let alone consume Kraft’s toxic products. Dump Kraft!”
The comment prior to this I posted on that Zesty guy’s fb wall. (Sorry, I mistakenly typed that note on the ‘website’ tab above!)
Love your website!! Thank you for bringing all the dangers of processed food to my attention!! I used to love the Kraft website for recipes until I searched for venison recipes and all they listed were recipes for dog food!! I come from a hunting/ fishing/ gardening family and I was completely disgusted that Kraft would dismiss venison as dog food!! I am purging my pantry of Kraft products!!
Oh my gosh! That is so funny and sad at the same time. We eat wild game too so I do find that offensive. I guess I’m not surprised though. They have a different view of what is “real food” than we do, right?!! Thanks for sharing.
I don”t think this will have much weight. Kraft will just find another pretty face to replace him…
It’s aggravating that Kraft thinks that we as their consumers (of which I am NOT anymore) can just be pacified with an attractive shirtless guy and that will be sufficient to make up for what they’re doing wrong! Well, it doesn’t! They’ve lost a customer in me.
Love this!! Please continue your efforts!! You will win this fight. I have donated all my Kraft products and have found many great alternatives. Please know how much I appreciate you opening my eyes to all of these toxins we are putting into our families bodies…….. scary!
I heard that Yoplait recently reformulated without artificial colors and HFCS due to customer comments. Granted this was on one of their commercials, so I don’t know the backstory or how much the company fought the change, but at least there is hope that customer feedback can still have an impact in the confusion if the modern day food industry landscape.
Genius Vani! 🙂
I bet just the news that he’s been asked to dump them and had his twitter and fb blow up over it, would be considered “Newsworthy” and some reporter could add a sexy interview with him to her repertoire! What news agency anchor is local to him that might want a “Hot” tip for a story?
I just have one question FoodBabe, I know Kraft is being used as an example but since I started eating more healthy food I noticed that just about everything in the grocery store is bad for you. I am mainly talking about packaged food. Why are we only focusing on Kraft? You need to start somewhere but shouldn’t everything that is bad for you be put on your website? I noticed that my cheese crackers which were an Aldi brand had food dye in it also. I am very thankful for your website because I never knew the effects of things like food dye on my children. But I have to tell you that I am spreading the word and people are still buying the products even though they know it is bad for their family.
Ill attempt a response for times sake for Vani… She started with Kraft since they are the largest headquartered food brand in America with the hopes that others will follow their lead when they take out dyes. Petitioning this brand has taken up so much of their (Vani & Lisa) time that I couldn’t imagine if they taken on another at the same time. She does have boycott lists for her readers, though, of other brands to steer clear of in the meantime. 🙂
Good job answering Liz.
Doreen – here is a great link that gives some info about which brands to support and which ones to boycott.
https://foodbabe.com/2012/08/16/the-companies-i-am-boycotting-and-why/
Oh my word, I screamed with laughter. You have some certified organic, non-GMO $#%&s (guts, I was gonna say guts).
Seriously, though, I wanted to pass on a site I just found. It is so awesome and important, and I thought you might like to share http://www.eattodefeat.org. The focus is more on what to eat (or add to your diet) rather than what to avoid, but it is chock-full of important info along with the research to back it up.
Hope you like it.
Monica
Great site! Thanks for sharing.
Don’t you think that if he isn’t going to be a spokesperson for this company, they will find some other sculpted body to do it?
You’re such a good writer. This is such a commodity these days. I used to have a boss who made twice what I made use the word were when he meant where. Good job! Your writing makes you that more credible. FYI – I have banned Kraft products from my home. 🙂
I tend to skip words when I am excited. “… made [and would] use the word were…”
I love it!!! You are so clever!
Chemicals are not sexy!! And you definitely do not get a body like that by eating processed junk food like anything made by Kraft!
Great job, Vani! That commercial is horrible with horrible acting! I doubt that he will respond. They pay him, so he probably doesn’t care what’s in the product. I hope I am wrong, though…
At the time of this post, Zesty Guy had received 210 FB messages on his wall! I almost stopped counting at about 150, but some of y’all’s comments were hilarious. Haven’t counted Twitter, but I’m sure it’s just at high or even higher. Keep it up! You’re awesome Vani!
The campaign against the food dyes makes sense but I don’t think listing “Sugar” as a GMO does. Sugar is sucrose. It’s a single molecule. The source of this molecule may change but sucrose stays sucrose. It would be like saying that iron isolated from a rock is somehow different from iron isolated from a chair; they are both the same element. I also want to ask if you have a link to any scientific studies (and not just popular articles) that unambiguously link these GMOs to diseases or harmful effects. I am sure that someone like you who writes about food and additives appreciates that science is all about details and it’s not easy to draw unambiguous connections between specific chemical compounds and diseases. Merely saying that something is “linked” to cancer says very little, since the purported link could be very strong or very weak.
I’m not sure on Food Babe’s position, but a lot of people are opposed to GMOs for more than the simple and direct health/nutrition of the GMO foods. There are a whole host of other related issues – multinational corporation are using GMOs to control our food landscape. They promise better yields, less pesticide use and fail to deliver on all counts. They are making more money as they’re forcing farmers to buy new seeds every year and use more and more pesticides. Meanwhile, soil quality is deteriorating, and our world is getting more and more polluted with pesticides.
Absolutely Brody! Lots of reasons that we believe GMOs are bad…
https://foodbabe.com/2013/01/15/label-gmos-in-north-carolina-act-now/#more-10830
Quantumburrito – the point is that GMOs have not been tested for long-term impacts on human health. I I do not want to take that chance, do you?
Krista: That’s a valid question, but wouldn’t the answer depend on the relative pros and cons? For instance if a particular GMO were increasing the concentration of an important nutrient in a fruit and vegetable then I would be interested in trying it out. However I appreciate that GMOs should be labeled. Then we could do more research and make up our own minds.
Brody: That’s a good point, and I think companies which use GMOs should be accountable and should demonstrate the claimed benefits.
I just wrote a post on Kraft Foods Facebook page saying that Kraft is banned from our home until they shape-up. I encourage everyone else to do the same. Lots of negative attention on such public forum is bound to get some recognition.
Thank you so much for the Kraft petition!! I have spread the word on my website, so I hope it helps!! We can do this!!!!! 🙂
Thank you so much Leigh, I really appreciate it!
Many those commercials are ridiculous!
Some family man, advertising his body to the whole world.
Thanks for all your efforts foodbabe!
You’re adorable AND smart! I love it.
Awe – Thank you! 🙂
THANK YOU! Fantastic way of bringing awareness to gmos!
I will be sharing this on my page.
Please sign the petition on the official White House site about GMO Labeling – https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/support-mandatory-labeling-genetically-engineered-foods-gmos/nkWHZ2Vm. The White House will respond to this petition if 100k signatures are received by May 12; there are 76,442 currently.
Thanks for sharing! I just signed.
Did he ever respond??
I’m all about what you are doing on your site, and this campaign, so thank you. That being said, I can’t help being a bit put off by you constantly addressing yourself as a “babe”. Things like “us babes need to stick together” make you come off as shallow and conceited, and they’re completely unnecessary. The fact that your site is called “Food Babe” is arrogant enough, you don’t need to constantly reassert yourself by writing it over and over again. I get it. The information is great, and I’m so glad of the work you’re doing, a bit of professionalism would make me want to read all your articles without being distracted with the fact that you worship yourself and need to remind us every waking second. I really don’t mean to be offensive, so pardon me if I come across as such.
Thanks again!
Oh Ana, I think you’re being very rude. Food Babe is a cute catchy name.