Firstly many thanks to all of you who took the time to fill in our Children and Food Advertising Questionnaire.

The main findings are below:

275 people took part in the survey.

The parents who responded had children of varying ages and the level of concern did not directly correlate to any specific child age range.

When asked the question 'Are you concerned that children are overly influenced by food products they see advertised?', only 20% of parents said they were very concerned. 40% admitted to being 'quite' concerned.

Overwhelmingly, over 95% of parents saw TV as being the most powerful source of influencing children regarding food products.

Three specific food types were identified as being those most likely to be requested by children as a result of TV exposure:

• Snacks - 21%



• Sweets - 21%



• Cereals - 15%

When asked if parents thought it would be easier to maintain a balanced diet for the children without food advertising aimed at children, 38% thought it would make a lot of difference, but a majority, 52%, thought it would only make a slight difference.

There were some excellent suggestions from parents as to how the affect of kids advertising could be 'modified'. Beyond the obvious removal of sweets from supermarket checkouts, there were some innovative ideas:

"Only have healthy food options at kids eye level and allow parents to pick 'treats' from higher shelves."

"Why do we need kids food at all? it is only a recent development and in my day there were no kids 'brands' at all-lets all eat the same things and then the problem disappears!"

A lot of parents took a positive view on how advertising could benefit the marketing of healthy products.

"Why is it only sweets/snacks/fizzy drinks that are marketed in colourful packaging with sports hero/cartoon character endorsement. Why not do the same with healthy products?"

Finally, many parents begged that free toys and 'in pack giveaways' be stopped as they were one of the hardest things to argue against.