Could 'pink slime' be rebranded?By Brian Wheeler BBC News, Washington
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17615456
Three out of the four US
factories making "lean beef trimmings" are to be shut down following a
public outcry. Is "pink slime" - as critics call it - finished or could
it be relaunched under a new name?
The look on shoppers' faces as Jamie Oliver sloshed ammonia into a bowl of what
he calls "pink slime" said it all.
They were horrified. They appeared to have no idea that the
burgers they had been buying all these years contained anything other
than prime cuts of beef.
But here was a TV chef showing them, in a 2011 edition of his US show Jamie's
Food Revolution, how their burgers are bulked out by
meat that in previous decades would have been used for dog food, and is
only made fit for human consumption by being treated with chemicals.Job losses
The decision by major US supermarkets, fast food restaurants - and some public
schools - to stop using food that contains Lean Finely
Textured Beef, to give "pink slime" its official name, is a victory for
Oliver and online campaigners who railed against it.
Pink slime
* Lean Finely Textured Beef is made from fatty beef carcass off-cuts
* It is heated and spun in a centrifuge to remove most of the fat
* It is then exposed to ammonium hydroxide gas to kill bacteria such as
E. coli and salmonella
* It has been added to burgers and other beef products in the US since
the early 1990s to keep costs down
* The term "pink slime" was coined in 2002 by former US government
scientist-turned whistleblower Gerald Zirnstein
* It was found in 70% of ground beef in US stores
* The US Department of Agriculture allowed schools to remove products
containing "pink slime" after an online petition
* Supermarkets and fast food outlets also joined in the boycott
* The beef industry claims it would have to kill an extra 1.5 million
cattle a year to make up the "pink slime" shortfall
But the resulting loss of 850
meat processing jobs, at a time when America is suffering high
unemployment, has angered many - and turned Jamie Oliver into a hate
figure on some message boards.
He probably did more than anybody to bring "pink slime" to
mainstream attention in the US, although the social media campaign to
kill it off did not take off until last month, when ABC World News with
Diane Sawyer ran an expose.
The US Department of Agriculture has now allowed schools to
remove products containing "pink slime" from their cafeteria menus after Texan
blogger Bettina Elias Siegel gathered more than 200,000 online
signatures in nine days.
For the meat processing industry, it has been a bruising
lesson in public relations and transparency in the age of social media.
Industry fight-back
It might also be the first example of a food ingredient being
withdrawn not because of any safety fears, but because people have
decided it sounds disgusting.
Jamie Oliver first alerted Americans to what was in their burgers
Industry chiefs are furious about what they see as a media-led
smear campaign against a product that has been used in the US since the
early 1990s and meets federal food safety standards.
Earlier this week, they launched a fight back - unveiling a
new slogan "Dude, it's beef" and enlisting the help of Texas governor
and former presidential candidate Rick Perry, who dutifully chowed down
on a burger containing the stuff on a visit to a processing plant in
South Sioux City, Nebraska.
To British eyes, this stunt contains echoes of Conservative
government minister John Gummer feeding his young daughter a beefburger, in
front of the TV news cameras, at the height of the "mad cow disease"
controversy in 1990.
But unlike the BSE outbreak no-one is seriously suggesting
"pink slime" is dangerous - or even that burgers containing it are
significantly less tasty or nutritious than other beef products.
The industry has launched a website, beefisbeef.com, to
emphasise this - although Gary Martin, president of brand-naming
consultants Gary Martin Group, believes they are missing the point.
"Who cares whether it's 100% beef and who cares whether it's
lacking bacteria, if it's something that you find disgusting?" he says.Tragedy
He describes what has happened to the company driven out of business by the
"pink slime" controversy as a tragedy.
The meat processing industry has launched a fight-back
But he says it was caused, in part, by the lack of a registered brand name for
their main product.
"They didn't brand themselves so someone else did," he explains.
Lean beef trimmings have never marketed to the public as a
product in their own right so it's doubtful the companies making them
would have thought that they needed a brand name.
But, says Martin, if they had been thinking ahead, they might have called the
product something consumer-friendly like "Pro-leana".
It might not have prevented the media backlash, but it might have helped them
deal with it better, he argues.Consumer anger
But, like most experts, he believes it is far too late to
rebrand the product now, as it would be seen as a marketing "ploy",
which would further inflame consumer anger.
Texas Governor Rick Perry does his bit for the beef processing industry
"Pink slime" is, in any case, a far more powerful brand name than anything the
industry could come up with.
"It is a powerful image. To try to replace that image with
something else might be tough," says EJ Schultz, a food marketing writer with
Advertising Age magazine.
He believes consumer anger has been driven by a lack of transparency.
"People are wondering 'why didn't I know about this before?
Why wasn't this labelled?' People want everything labelled these days."
Jason Karpf, who teaches public relations and marketing, also believes the food
industry has got a lot to learn about modern
consumers.
He says: "The heightened nature of consumer awareness means
that food manufacturers must look at every component of their end user
product and imagine public reaction to it. Predict and prepare for
public reaction."
The next 'pink slime'?
Meat processors have been adding beef scraps to burgers and
other products since the 1970s to keep costs down - but they will now
have to come with a replacement "that can withstand lay person
scrutiny," says Mr Karpf.
Butchers across America have spotted a marketing opportunity
"They are going to have to think about the product itself
before they try to come up with a name, and a campaign, that - dare I
say - the public will swallow."
He sees parallels with High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) - a
substance added to food for more than 30 years, but which recent studies have
linked to obesity.
The makers of HFCS, which is derived from a chemical process, rebranded it as
"corn sugar" - but they are locked in a legal battle
with the sugar industry over the use of the term.
"In decades past, High Fructose Corn Syrup was just an ingredient on the back
label if people chose to read it" says Mr Karpf.
"It is under a spotlight. Lean Finely Textured Beef was
something the public was unaware of until the great increase in media
and social media gave it prominence."
But while HFCS may yet have a future, "pink slime" does not, he argues.
Others are not so sure. EJ Shultz believes food containing
lean beef trimmings could, when properly labelled, become a low-cost
alternative for cash-strapped beef lovers.
Branding consultant Denise Lee Yohn believes that for the
companies involved, it might just be a case of waiting for the fuss to
die down.
Social media is a powerful consumer advocacy tool but the
groundswell of anger generated by it can also be short-lived, she
argues.
"If they can wait it out, and let the hype die down, about
six months from now no-one will think anything of it and they can come
back with the product."
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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