Kids have been drinking less soda and eating more fruit and
yogurt at McDonald's restaurants, the company and a partner said in
their first report on the fast-food giant's efforts to offer
healthier options for its Happy Meals.
The report was issued Thursday by McDonald's Corp. and the
Alliance for a Healthier Generation, a nonprofit founded by the
Clinton Foundation and the American Heart Association to reduce
childhood obesity. The pair in 2013 announced McDonald's would stop
promoting soft drinks as a Happy Meal option on its menu boards and
that it would emphasize nutrition on its kids' food packaging in 20
major markets representing more than 85% of McDonald's sales.
The progress report said that since sodas were removed from the
Happy Meal section of menu boards in the U.S., 46% of Happy Meal
customers chose milk and juice, up from 37% prior to the removal.
During the same period, the percentage of customers selecting soda
for Happy Meals dropped to 48% from 56%. Kids also have been opting
for yogurt and clementine oranges since those items have been
offered. The report focused only on the U.S. and Italy.
The results are promising, nutrition experts say, given
customers' general reluctance to select healthier options even when
they are promoted. Before McDonald's automatically included apple
slices in its Happy Meals in 2011, it had offered them for many
years as a substitute for fries, but parents rarely chose them.
When McDonald's tested a Happy Meal version that didn't contain
fries, parents complained. Some studies have shown that when
calorie information is displayed on menu boards, people choose
lower-calories options initially and then revert back to buying
their old, higher-calorie favorites.
"In less than a year period to see a shift away from soda is
encouraging," said Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy for
the Center for Science in the Public Interest, an advocacy group
that's been pushing McDonald's and other restaurant chains to
improve the nutrition of kids' meals. "Given that for decades
restaurants have been promoting soda on kids' menus, it's going to
take time to get into a new mind-set. Taking soda off the menu is a
really important step."
Ms. Wootan said Restaurant Brands International Inc.'s Burger
King, Wendy's Co. and American Dairy Queen Corp. followed
McDonald's lead in removing soda from kids' menus, but that the
majority of chain restaurants still feature soda on kids'
menus.
McDonald's didn't fulfill its commitment last year to offer a
side salad, fruit or vegetable as a substitute for fries in its
value meals in the U.S., though it began doing so this year. Just
2% of McDonald's restaurants in the U.S. offered side salads in
value meals last year, but by early this year, 83% did.
Changing adults' ordering habits is going to be harder. Despite
McDonald's efforts to add entree-size salads to the menu in recent
years, they have never been a big seller, only making up 2% to 3%
of U.S. sales.
"Fast food companies have spent so much money promoting fries
that we've become conditioned to think that when we go to a
fast-food restaurant, whatever meal we get should include an order
of fries," Ms. Wootan said, adding that it will take years of
aggressive marketing and compelling menu items to steer customers
away from fries.
Write to Julie Jargon at julie.jargon@wsj.com
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