Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 11, 1993 TAG: 9307110057
SECTION: NATL/INTL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAY MATHEWS THE WASHINGTON POST
DATELINE: NEW YORK LENGTH: Long
She is not alone. After years of warnings about the dangers of excess weight and fatty foods, Americans show signs of sliding back into what many dietitians consider bad habits. Perhaps because of relaxed attitudes toward excess weight, craving brought on by diets or the stress of economic uncertainty, these consumers seem determined to enjoy the richest products of an endlessly inventive food industry no matter what the consequences.
Haagen-Dazs new Extraas line of ice creams, with 16 percent to 17 percent butterfat, has increased the company's market share by more than a third in less than a year. Flavors such as Triple Brownie Overload, Caramel Cone Explosion and Cookie Dough Dynamo are filling the stomachs of even health-conscious consumers such as Epstein who want their occasional indulgence to pack a wallop.
Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc., Haagen-Dazs Vermont-based competitor, also reports that sales are brisk for its 15 percent butterfat "super premium" ice creams, including Wavy Gravy and New York Super Fudge Chunk.
And 100 of the 250 McDonald's restaurants in the Washington area are experimenting with the Mega Mac, a half-pound beef concoction that delivers more meat, cheese and sauce than ever seen in the national chain.
Opinion polls indicate a significant change in national attitudes about body type. A survey by the NPD Group, a market research company in Port Washington, N.Y., reveals a steady decline in the percentage of Americans who say overweight people are unattractive - from 55 percent in 1985 to 36 percent last year.
The National Association to Aid Fat Americans became so encouraged by the attitude change that it altered its name to the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance.
"This has all the earmarks of a consistent trend," said Harry Balzer, a vice president of the NPD Group. "There is a structural change taking place. This is not a fad."
Louis Harris and Associates released a report on American health for the health care products giant Baxter International Inc. earlier this year.
"When it comes to voluntary health habits," a Baxter International statement said, "the nation is at best holding the line, and at worst slipping from gains made in the early- to mid-1980s."
In the Harris survey, 66 percent of 1,251 Americans sampled said they were overweight in 1992, up from 58 percent in 1983. Forty-four percent said they tried hard to avoid cholesterol and 51 percent tried hard to avoid fat - both percentages down six points from 1991. Only 33 percent reported getting strenuous exercise at least three times a week, a drop of four percentage points from 1991.
Balzer said the possible change in American attitude, like many other trends of the late 20th century, may be tied to the aging of the post-World War II baby boom generation.
"Every one of them is aging and nearly every one of them is putting on weight and each is discovering that putting on weight is not such a big deal," he said.
Sid Craig, chairman and chief executive of the California-based diet services company Jenny Craig Inc., said he agreed that "baby boomers are finding that losing weight becomes more difficult with each passing decade."
But he warned that "Americans simply cannot ignore the health risks of obesity," including heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and some forms of cancer.
Diet experts said the apparent decline in healthy habits may be only a temporary setback in what has been a fairly steady decline in American consumption of fat and cholesterol. Supermarket shelves are still full of low-fat and nonfat products.
"It is evident there is a demand for them," said John Deckard, spokesman for Safeway Inc. stores in the Washington metropolitan area.
Karen Brown, vice president for communications at the Washington-based Food Marketing Institute, said there are some nonfat cookies "that they literally cannot keep on the shelves."
But industry surveys show that the overall demand for diet products is no longer climbing at its 1980s pace, and nutrition experts said there is reason for concern.
"My own view is that the [economy] has led people to go back to poor eating habits," said David Herbert, chief of the division of clinical nutrition at the University of California at Los Angeles.
Average cholesterol levels have declined 4 percent in 12 years, with measurements too infrequent to catch any recent upturn. Annual per capita consumption of red meat, high in fat and cholesterol, dropped 20 pounds per person from 1970 to 1990, while consumption of chicken, considered healthier, increased by the same amount.
Doctors said that the lower cholesterol counts also could be affected by increased use of anti-cholesterol medicine and emphasized that most Americans, whatever their eating habits, are still subject to weight gain because they shun exercise.
John LaRosa, editor and publisher of the Diet Business Bulletin of Valley Stream, N.Y., said the economy has stymied the diet foods and services industry, which he estimated will grow only 3.5 percent this year, compared with double-digit growth in the mid-1980s.
"We used to have at least one major diet book on the hardback best-seller list each year and we haven't seen that in three years now," he said.
by CNB