Bad burritos, corporate marketing schemes and American farmers
A couple of years ago I had a free consultation with a nutritionist as part of my membership at an area health club. Normally, I would have blown off the consultation. I knew my eating habits needed improvement. Why would I waste an hour having some stranger tell me the obvious?
But for some reason, I set an appointment with the nutritionist. She told me to keep a diary of everything I ate that week and bring it to our session.
Ok. Easy enough.
My diary wasn’t completely filled with foods I shouldn’t be eating. There were lean meats and fruits mixed in with the slices of pizza and stops at the convenience store for a bag of M&M’s. When I handed the nutritionist my diary, I was only slightly ashamed instead of completely embarrassed.
I braced for the worst when the nutritionist was done looking at what I handed her. She didn’t say much as she was going through it. And she stopped to circle things and make notes after a few of the entries.
She gave me the usual advice and asked the usual questions: Try to limit junk food to once a week. Make smaller portions so you’re not tempted to overeat. Did you really need that beer before going to bed on Wednesday?
None of it was anything I hadn’t heard before. Then she told me something that I had, in fact, not heard before: The worst thing in my food diary was Chipotle. By far.
The barbacoa burrito that I loaded up with my favorite extras like cheese and guacamole was 1,200 calories. “Twelve-hundred calories!” I protested. “That can’t be right. Chipotle says it uses all-natural ingredients and their burritos don’t drip grease like a fast-food cheeseburger.”
The nutritionist’s response: “Chipotle is fast food. They just do a better job of convincing you that they aren’t.”
Here I thought Chipotle wasn’t going to clog my arteries as fast as a typical fast food joint. I was wrong.
But it didn’t stop me from continuing to eat at Chipotle. Every time a Chipotle worker would shovel a giant scoop of guacomole or pinto beans on my burrito like an over-zealous school lunch lady, I felt guilty, but not guilty enough to give up Chipotle.
Over the years, I did stop going to Chipotle. Not because of how unhealthy its food is, but because my tastes evolved. Once I started expanding my food horizons and eating at authentic Mexican restaurants and dining establishments that truly do care about food, I realized that Chipotle wasn’t very good.
Now Chipotle is trying to win me back with a multi-million dollar marketing campaign disguised as a web series that attempts to convince me Chipotle is actually that independent local Mexican restaurant that I left Chipotle for in the first place. In the process, the mega fast-food chain is stomping all over traditional American agriculture.
Nice try Chipotle, but your downtrodden scarecrows and exploding cows aren’t going to convince me that your bland and unimaginative burritos are better than the burritos at a place like this. And the writing on your web series is more “Jerry Springer Show” than “True Detective.” I don’t see any Emmy’s in your future.
Why is Chipotle shoveling manure on farmers just to sell more burritos? Farmers are the very people Chipotle buys its ingredients from in the first place. Trying to subtlety turn people against American farmers just so Chipotle can increase profits for shareholders and executives isn’t “food with integrity,” it’s corporate schilling at its worst.
Chipotle realizes that more and more people are recognizing it for what it is: a cheap fast food joint. And they want to change that growing perception ASAP.
There are ways to accomplish this without demagoguing American farmers (I’d start by making a better burrito) but Chipotle has chosen instead to turn one group of people (consumers) against another group of people (farmers).
Will it work? You never know. So far the reviews are mixed at best.
If it doesn’t work, does Chipotle care? There are more than 1,500 Chipotles in the United States. Its stock sells for around $550 per share and its stock market value is around $15 billion. Chipotle isn’t the innocent values-driven small business it’s trying to portray itself as.
If trashing farmers doesn’t move more burritos, Chipotle will just reach into the couch cushions for a couple million more dollars and try something else. Meanwhile, farmers will be left to answer even more questions from a confused public about how their food is grown.
What’s worse: Chipotle’s blah burritos and high calorie counts or its irresponsible corporate marketing tactics? It’s a close competition.
My nutritionist would probably feel like the real winner in all of this. My food diary no longer includes entries from Chipotle.
Written by Adam Czech, MCGA
