“Manfluencers” don’t eat quiche. (They eat protein pie.)
by digby
In a June survey of 900 meat-eating men ages 18 to 64, 47% were deemed “manfluencers” by Midan Marketing LLC, a Chicago market research group focused on the meat industry. Manfluencers are responsible for at least half of the grocery shopping and meal preparation for their households.
Food company executives hope more men shopping means new opportunities for foods some men have traditionally shied away from in this country, including yogurt and hard cider. The changes are often cosmetic: larger portions or darker color schemes instead of recipes on the backs of packages.
Lots of products on food shelves are big no-nos to men, says Lu Ann Williams, head of research for Netherlands-based Innova Market Insights. Others help men feel more, well, manly. “A beer or soda in a long-necked, brown bottle makes a man feel like a man. Drinking out of a straw does not—puckered lips and sunken cheeks are not a good guy look.”
Which helps explain Powerful Yogurt, a Greek yogurt launched in March featuring a bull’s head symbol on red-and-black packaging and an image of stomach muscles next to the slogan “Find Your Inner Abs.”
It’s hard for me to believe that men really give a damn about this, but if they do, they need to get over it. The idea that eating certain food makes you look “like a girl” is so stupid I don’t know what to say.
But hey, these marketing people know what they’re doing so there must be a bunch of guys out there who have been too afraid to buy yogurt or drink a coke (with or without a straw) because they think it’s all girly so I’m sure this will make somebody some money, the most likely being the marketing company that came up with concept of “manfluencers.”
(They are missing the most important food “manfluencers” of all, though: mothers.)
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