cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/2089880
Archived version: https://archive.ph/LagwN
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20230830080638/https://www.bbc.com/news/business-66654440
When I buy a new car, the car is the same as the one in the posters and built by the same people.
A team of food stylists spent at least 30 minutes to create the perfect whopper for the add image and were paid 100 times more than an actual fast food employee to do so.
Why that is allowed to represent something made in 30 seconds by someone on shit wages is beyond me.
Not to mention that the food stylists create something that isn’t even edible. They frequently use things that aren’t food to make it look more palatable onscreen.
I used to work in product photography. That is not true or legal here in Aus. The only thing they are allowed to use in the picture are ingredients used in store.
I cannot speak to the laws in other markets but that is not the case everywhere.
Of course they will go through hundreds of buns to find the perfect one etc, so it is still incredibly wasteful.
Same thing in Europe. But I think in the US everything is allowed (surprise surprise)
Freedom
to manipulate and trick our consumersmotherfucker 🦅Everything for the God of Profits
Surely that one must be related to Supply Side Jesus
I heard it used to be, but isn’t anymore. Granted, this is hearsay with no source, but a buddy of mine who worked in advertising was telling me about it a while back. Could be wrong tho.
While it doesn’t have to be “food”, it does have to be edible in the US…
But that aside, burger king used to be good. It used to be decent sized and was almost worth the cost. Now on the other hand, it is so tiny and doesn’t feel remotely worth the price.
In my area, they just closed about 5 locations this year, and to be honest, I am only sad about the few people losing their job at these locations.
Burger King has gone so far down hill since 2020.
Man that sucks, BK in Toronto is still a nice big burger, and on Whopper Wednesday it’s cheap so it’s definitely worth it. Shame the US side has gone to shit.
They’re still an absurdly huge burger at every Burger King near me in the US. The suit is alleging they’re smaller than the advertisements. Not sure what OP is talking about but one thing I’ve noticed about BK is they are wildly inconsistent from location to location so it might be even more regional.
Everything is edible at least once.
This lawsuit is not happening in Australia.
Even in places where they have to use the actual ingredients, there’s a lot of tricks to making it look different in photos. That burger might only be partially cooked to reduce shrinkage, then the burger and bun are frozen so they hold shape for the photo. Vegetables carefully picked out and arranged, tomato/pickles blotted dry, and the sauce applied with an eye dropper to provide visual balance after the rest of the burger is stacked.
I will say from my experience, that tends to apply to advertising photography for large franchises. If we’re taking about food photography associated with a high profile event or restaurant where food is actually served, there’s minimal difference between the photo plate and what’s actually served. Sometimes the photo plate is just one picked out while producing the ones being served, sometimes it’s the first/last plate and a person takes a minute to pick out the best looking of ingredients from the same container that was used to serve the rest. Sometimes it’s just an extra minute arranging the plate nicely compared to the last 150 that were done quickly to keep up with service. Often the photographer then gets to eat the plate they’ve just photographed.
Advertising is scum and I don’t understand why we allow it all.
It does not help the economy to distract consumers all day as much as possible, all it does is let companies compete on the basis of who can spend the most on advertising or who can hire the most manipulative advertisers rather than who can make the best product.
Everyone thinks, “But advertising doesn’t work on me.” That’s why it’s still legal.
Advertising works on everyone. Just there are those of us that don’t impuls buy and look into and research the interesting product they just seen an ad for, before buying. But billboards those annoy the shit out of me. Like I know McDonald’s exists and there is a 70% chance there is one at the next exit, why do I need 4 billboards telling my there is a McDonald’s coming up in 5 exits?
Those billboards aren’t for you, they’re to remind the kids in the back that McDonald’s exists.
Because an alarming amount of drivers are doing any number of things besides looking out of the windshield and probably missed 3/4 of them.
And this is why there’s a row of billboards advertising a sex store near me. I think there’s like 10 of them, and there’s always at least one with an anti-porn Jesus message in the mix. It’s kinda glorious.
But billboards should be banned. They are a distraction, they ruin otherwise pleasant scenery, and we just don’t need the ads. We get enough ads, damn.
I agree but it is a tough one to police. If your business is next to a road, can you advertise from there? What signage you allowed to put up? Only your own? What if you have two business on the same property? Both get a sign? What if you sell McDonalds a 5% stake in your land?
But they are an eyesore. Hate them.
Not really that tough to police, they just need to put more robust and consistent regulations in place. There are already many regulations on building signage, and if billboards would be banned they would need to fully define what was banned so… I don’t see this actually being that much of a problem.
For example, specifically the accessory vs advertising section: https://www.signsny.com/blog/nyc-signs-rules-and-regulations
It should simply be considered false advertisement.
You can probably legally require your money back, saying it looks nothing like the photos, but that’s not enough imo
That’s why a big lawsuit is a better solution. They’ve already stolen the search cost from you, and are relying on you just giving up when you see your disappointment burger.
Fun fact, most car advertising uses a computer generated car. Photoreal cars bave been achievable for years now and it just makes sense for them to do it as they can keep it looking flawless throughout the ad. There’s even a “mocap” car with an adjustable body to match the length/width etc. of the car it’s supposed to be that they can just pin the model to.
Most American lawsuit in the world lol
I’ve eaten the whopper like thrice ever and it is a massive burger
And where did you get that Whopper? Because out here in Kentucky meth country, they are sad excuses for sandwiches.
Are we accustomed to larger portions? Sure. That’s not the point. The point is that the ad doesn’t match what you purchase.
Really? Whoppers were really small, the times I tried it.
Don’t other countries have truth in advertising laws?
We do, but on the other hand, we have no idea what a quarter pounder is.
[JULES] They don’t call it a Quarter Pounder with Cheese?
[VINCENT] No, they got the metric system there, they wouldn’t know what the fuck a Quarter Pounder is.
[JULES] Then what do they call it?
[VINCENT] They call it Royale with Cheese.
[JULES] Royale with Cheese. What do they call a Big Mac?
[VINCENT] Big Mac’s a Big Mac, but they call it Le Big Mac.
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What I mean is “boo hoo my burger is not big enough”
It’s an American lawsuit anyway
You should have read the article, then. It’s about false advertising.
Yeah if you look at the pictures in the article, you can see the advertisement shows the patty being 20?% larger than the bun underneath it. The photo under that shows the actual patty being slightly (10?%) smaller than the bun. I assume that’s how the 35% number was determined.
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Unless we’re talking about prostitutes, this comparison to commercial advertising is specious.
Maybe they are diferent in your country. Back before covid i somtimes had to go there and ordered 2 or 3 doble whoopers and and i remember it being way too expensive. I left hungry and feeling riped off.
In Asia, a whopper is small as compared with the US
How does it compare to what BK calls the Whopper Jr in at least the US and EU?
That I’m not sure of.
THIS is what people are suing corporations over? Not climate change or wage theft?
This species is doomed.
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again:
Nothing matters to most Burgerlanders but the treats. Threaten the treats, and they’ll get weird and maybe even get violent. We saw that during covid restrictions making sit-in restaurants less convenient.
Sometimes I’m surprised very little of them are upset about climate change and capitalism because it threatens recreation.
Oceans filled with plastic? Rent and house price alike are both too expensive to live anywhere near the beach? Hiking trails become littered with plastic? Hell, walkable cities are filled with amenities giving someone a lot of ways to spend their time. Granted, I don’t think neither nature nor architecture qualifies as “treats” let alone something burgerlanders care that much about.
It isn’t individually owned by some petty “middle class” asshole so they don’t care if it is ruined as long as they got theirs compared to the poors.
Climate change and wage theft are very hard to prove and bring consequences for by design of the system, but if your burger is too small that’s pretty easy to sue over for false advertising.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The lawsuit accuses the fast food giant of misleading customers by showing the burger with a meatier patty and ingredients that “overflow over the bun”.
The class action lawsuit against Burger King alleged that the Whopper was made to look 35% larger, with more than double the amount of meat compared to what was actually served to customers.
Lawyer Anthony Russo, who represents the plaintiffs, did not immediately respond to a BBC request for comment.
Earlier this year, Taco Bell was sued in the US for selling pizzas and wraps that allegedly contained half the filling that was advertised.
Last year, a man in New York proposed a class-action lawsuit against McDonald’s and Wendy’s, in which he accused the two companies of unfair and deceptive trade practices.
The lawsuit alleged that McDonald’s and Wendy’s burgers in marketing materials were at least 15% larger than they were in real life.
The original article contains 328 words, the summary contains 149 words. Saved 55%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
imo, the dishonesty is less about the size and more about how all the toppings look fresh on the menu, while in person they look like aged out grocery store culls and the burger always looks like someone put it between their ass cheeks and then watched a Peter Jackson movie before serving it.
i don’t really really get how one articulates that in a lawsuit.
i never really noticed it besides the hack bit in Falling Down until i went to a mcdonalds in japan. every item on the menu came out like a goddamn prop for a promotional photo. surreal. kinda made me realize that unless you’re willing to fork over a day’s median wage or more in the US for a prepared meal or go to some mom and pop place that gives a shit, you’re gonna get fuck you food from someone being paid a poverty wage to slop together utility-tier ingredients because screwing over the customer and the worker is what makes rich people more money.
You really hit the nail on the head here. And you’re absolutely right about the perfection of fast food in Japan. Well… don’t order the fried chicken… but, most other things.
Who cares about the size?
I want a burger that doesn’t taste like kerosene, with vegetables that were grown in the last decade, served by someone who isn’t contemplating stabbing me.
And can I get cheese on that?
And can I get cheese on that?
Will pasteurized process cheese product do?
I’d like to know what I’ll get before I order. If the advertisement shows the burger with some size, I expect the same size when I order. Why should I get a smaller burger than the advertisement shows?
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That was the first thing that popped into my head too. I was gonna say, sounds like a problem for D-FENS.
It was decades ago but Burger King was a bit of a staple for me for a few years when I lived close to a franchise operator that was consistent. It has been awhile and I knew things had gone downhill and some of the franchise operators are very shitty but I was shocked last time we went. The restaurant was filthy and the tables and floors were covered in food. The burgers looked to be thrown together out of bin leftovers. Can’t say I blame staff for the lack of enthusiasm given their employer has a known history of wage theft. We couldn’t tell the differences between the more expensive special and regular whopper so took the mess to the counter to ask what the fuck we were given and why it looked nothing like the photo. The whole family swore off them for life. Never going back.
🍔BURGER TOO SMALL
Supposedly its a 1/4 pound patty. Compare to the mcd’s quarter pounder. The whopper is thin, and I wouldn’t be surpised if it was smaller than advertised
Eh, I think surface area is larger on a whopper n the meat sticks out of the bun more. Admittedly, the last time I got a whopper was in an airport like 6 months ago bc all chain fast food is absolute ass these days and way overpriced. I try to avoid it outright, but sometimes it’s the only option.
I used to get Whopper Jrs cos the regular Whopper was too big…
I for one am shocked and appalled those who serving poisoned slop have, in fact, considered lying about it.
Okay but the size is actually fine as it is (in Australia)
It’s not about what the size is, it’s about the discrepancy between the advertised size and the actual.
Same for Penn Station. I stopped there on a road trip recently. What a total disappoint. The 6in sun has 2.5 oz of meat. WTF SMH. Never again.
Finally! I have been saying this for years.
The only fast food chain meal that comes in a decent size is the kfc large chiken bucket.
