Campbell's Soup Ads Analysis

Kicking the Can… “I like food. I like eating. And I don't want to deprive myself of good food.” - Sarah Michelle Gellar
The best way to satisfy hunger is to eat a nutritious, fulfilling meal at either breakfast, lunch or dinner. For a man (or woman) who just came back from a hard day’s of work, there is nothing more nourishing than a meaty broth. Since 1869, Campbell’s Soup Company has been around for quite some time. They happen to be well-known for their soup products. Going by the slogan “M'm! M'm! Good! ,” Campbell’s Soup Company is one of the many conglomerates whose marketing tactics changed with the course of time, as well as using beef, where the quality of meat eroded throughout the years as part of a plan the food industry created
for production efficiency.
In 1941, Campbell experimented with “developing recipes using condensed soups that become classics” (Campbell’s About Us). During this time period, advertisements about their take-home soups soon caught the public’s eye. In one of their ads, they illustrate four women standing near a sign stating “For MEN Only.” Underneath the sign, the words ‘ “He-Man” is the word for these hearty soups! But, Ladies, you’ll like ‘em too!” ’ is disclosed. Furthermore, there is a claim on the bottom right of the advertisement, declaring “BEEF is big news everywhere today!” Campbell’s beef soup ad markets women and the meat craze - the masculinity of beef - while living up to the expectations of bringing “authentic, flavorful and readily available foods and beverages…” (Campbell’s About Us par. 1), thereby creating a dichotomy between three issues.
Beef (and other meat products) is the go-to for protein and hunger. Gone are the days when quality no longer matters, but the sheer satisfaction of dominating the monetary squeeze. Within the food industry, people “[are] always looking for greater efficiency, but each new step in efficiency leads to problems” (Food, Inc. 1:06). Within Campbell’s 1940 beef soup advertisement, it promised “a grand, deep-flavored beef stock, with hefty pieces of tender beef within it…” In the past, cattle were grass-fed, and when put on the market shelves as beef, the product “contained more…omega-3 fatty acids, despite having lower fat content. [Pasture-fed (PF)] beef had higher antioxidant capacity, and lower oxidation indices…” (Tansawat et al.484). In addition, grass-fed (pasture-fed) beef has a“~75% reduction in fat calories per serving compared with grain-fed beef” (493), which is good for people who are “at risk for chronic diseases, i.e., cardiovascular disease or anyone who wants to lose weight” (493). Instead of grass, the original food source for cattle is phased-out for corn. The reason for this is because a “large demand for beef could be foreseeable for most developing countries and particularly for those with large populations and rapid demographic growth rate” (Li et al. 1) such as the United States. To meet these popular demands, corn is overproduced, and fed to the animals we eat such as cattle, pigs, and chicken. This commodity crop is cheap to harvest, which “allowed [corporations] to drive down the price of meat” (Food Inc. 21:10). In addition, Food Inc. mentions that “The average American is eating over 200 pounds of meat per person per year, and that wouldn’t be possible, had we not have fed them this diet of cheap grain” (21:14). According to Michael Pollan, corn allows cows’ to become “fat quickly” (22:10), allowing for more meat to accrue. This is because “Seventy-five years ago it took a cow four to five years to reach a slaughter weight of 1,200 pounds” (Kiernan par. 2). Corn and other factors such as hormones’ speed up the growth process of cattle within “13-15 months” (par. 2). Unfortunately, this becomes an unforeseen consequence when a product’s quality is reduced to meet the masses.
Regarding Campbell’s 1940 beef soup advertisement, beef yielded nutritious quality because cows were grass-fed. Now that livestock today are corn-fed, which they “are not designed by evolution to eat…” (Food Inc., 22:01), the merit beef had in the past is slowly fading. Furthermore, a danger arises from the diet cows are fed nowadays. E. coli is “a type of bacteria that normally live in the intestines of people and animals” (Pientrangelo par. 1). Because cows are nourished with an altered diet of corn, a variation called E. coli 0157 h7 sprung up. While filming at a CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations), Food Inc. interviewed Allen Trenkle, an expert on ruminant nutrition at Iowa State University. Trenkle articulates that “The animals [(cows)] evolved on consuming grass. There’s some research that indicate that high corn diet results in E. coli that are acid-resistant, and these would be the more harmful E. coli” (22:53). Being “a common bug [that evolved], and a certain mutation occurs…” (23:18), this is the result “of the diet we’re feeding cattle on feedlots, and it’s the product of feedlot life” (23:32). In addition to feeding cows what they are not supposed to eat, the livestock also lives a slummy lifestyle as “The animals stand ankle-deep in their manure all day long” (23:39). During slaughtering, there is the possibility of cross-contamination between fecal matter and the carcasses that are about to be packaged and shipped. Safety no longer matters in the foods that we eat, “and now this thing that wasn’t in the world, it’s in the food system” (24:06). Campbell’s beef soup used grass-fed cattle in their products in the past and there is a likely chance that now they might be using contaminated meat as a result of feeding corn to cows.
Another issue is addressed within Campbell’s 1940 beef soup advertisement; the role of females in a modernized, yet patriarchal society.
The ad shows four women standing around a sign that says “For MEN Only.” They don what the average housewife wore during the 1940s –aprons. There is a play-on with diction under the sign stating ‘ “He-Man” is the word for these hearty soups! But, Ladies, you’ll like ‘em too!” A he-man is a robust chap, and what ways to best describe a product that is tiered originally towards men. The sentence that says “But, Ladies, you’ll like ‘em too!”, could mean that women find strong men irresistible. In the case of beef soup, womenfolk would love this product just as much as they love manly-men. The problem displayed within the ad is that they stigmatized women as being a hopeless bunch without a man to be there to guide them. They are circumscribed towards just being a housewife. There is a “gendered split between the public and private [spheres]” (Day 127). Tracing “back to the Industrial Revolution…men began to perform paid labor outside of the home and women continued to perform the unpaid family labor (Medved, 2007).” (127). This soon became “the product of hegemonic patriarchal power structures that privilege men’s work over women’s work (Fletcher, 1999)” (127) due to the “separation of domestic and professional spheres…” (127). Because of this, “Men’s paid labor has historically been valued more than women’s unpaid domestic labor,
which is deemed unproductive (Crittenden, 2001).” (127). Campbell’s beef soup advertisement indirectly breaks this stigma of “men only” by stating that women would “like ‘em too!” just as much as the guys do. This is one of their ways of increasing their customer demographics, not just tapering certain products to a particular gender.
In addition to relegating women towards being a housewife, there is also the virility of beef - a generalization as to what makes men find meat essential for machismo.
Over the course of mankind, “meat has been closely associated with power and privilege—a staple for the gentry and a rare treat for the peasants” (Ruby, Heine 448). Linking back to Campbell’s 1940 beef soup advertisement, beef is illustrated as a “For MEN Only” diet. There is a possibility that the ad’s secret message conveys’ females as being vegans’ since “people’s perceptions of vegetarians found that women were more accepting of vegetarians than men (Walker, 1995)…” (447). Furthermore, “[women’s] attitudes toward vegetarians were predominantly positive, especially among those [that scored] low in authoritarianism (Chin, Fisak, & Sims, 2002), and that omnivores tend to rate vegetarians as good, but weak people (Monin & Minson, 2007).” (447). In other words, women and vegetarians are seen as inferior compared to those who eat meat – though this is seen a generalization/perception in society. On the other hand, vegetarians are also perceived as people that have “a stronger sense of virtue and morality in those who abstain from eating meat” (450), since they abide by “four principal reasons: concern for animal welfare, concern for the environment, concern for health, and disgust at the sensory qualities of meat (e.g. Fox & Ward, 2008; Santos & Booth, 1996; Worsley & Skrzypiec, 1998).” (447). For males,
“manhood is earned through social displays, competition, and aggression, and is socially, rather than biologically determined” (450). However, there are questions as to whether a man is macho or not, since “manhood is still considered a precarious state, easily lost and requiring constant validation” (450). In the case of beef, if a man were to give up meat, then their manhood card would be revoked and even though he “is perceived as more principled [by becoming a vegetarian],” (450), he is also “less manly” (450). Campbell’s advertisement of beef soup is also trying to persuade more women to eat meat – another way of increasing customer demographics. In addition, this particular ad for beef soup might also try to coax men not to go vegan because if a man does not eat meat, then he is not considered a man; just a lady trapped in a man’s body that upholds effeminate traits – an indirect, yet a secret Machiavellian marketing tactic used during this time period.
The eras are always changing. The old methods become relics of the past that got lost through the sands of time. For Campbell’s Soup Company, beef soup is one of their many products sold on market shelves. Now that women are given more options in what they want to do with their lives either than just being a housewife, the marketing tactics used during the 1940s would no longer serve this purpose. Advertising has to appeal to a broader spectrum of individuals. Moreover, the way how our food is produced changed throughout the years. Utilizing older methods of production is not effective enough to satisfy the hungry mouths of millions. Even though the food industry created methods for production efficiency such as feeding corn to cattle that allowed for an abundance of food (beef), quantity over quality becomes the slogan; thereby putting lives at risk for eating an adulterated product. Though Campbell’s Soup Company is one of the many businesses that go with the flow of vicissitudes that come with time, their products would not have the same merit it once had in the past.