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Thursday morning’s seminar, Best Practices in Social Media, played to a packed house. It could be people were raring to go the day before the show begins. But more likely the high attendance speaks to just how eager companies are to expand their online presence through Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and the like.

For companies used to delivering polished, deliberate marketing messages, social media is a significant change of pace. It’s quick, casual, and predominantly user-generated. It’s a “me”-focused space where people come not to be pitched or marketed to, but rather to connect and to be entertained.

So how do companies break through to a non-captive audience like this? First, a few stats, courtesy of presenter Mauricio Lluch, president of the consulting firm eMarketing Naturally.

- Facebook has 400 million users, 32% of them older than 35.

- YouTube has 173 million monthly viewers, more than 50% of whom make more than $60,000 per year.

- 82% of brands are currently utilizing social media.

Clearly, the opportunity is there. And making an impact, according to Lluch and fellow presenter Heather Smith, founder of PR firm Lady Luxe Inc. means being honest, informative, and even quirky. To demonstrate the latter quality, Lluch showed this YouTube video made by the BlendTec blender company, in which the company’s president throws an iPhone into one of his blenders as part of their ongoing series, “Will it Blend?” MORE…

The following post was filed by Matthew Reynolds, managing editor of Modern Baking and Baking Management magazines, both sister publications to Supermarket News

If 2009 was about inexpensive, 2010 is about simple. If consumers can’t pronounce the ingredient, they don’t want it. Instead, they are looking for simple packaging and simple formulations; fewer ingredients, cleaner labels and slimmer packaging.

* 48% of products in the U.S. showed a decline in the average number of ingredients in the first three quarters of 2009. ( Mintel)

* Haagen-Dasz introduced its Five line of ice cream with only five ingredients–milk, cream, sugar, eggs and one natural flavor, like mint.

* Starbucks changed its banana bread from 15 ingredients to 10.

According to Lynn Dornblaser of Mintel, a consumer research firm based in Chicago, products with simplified labels will be more sought after in 2010 than those that contain the former buzzwords “organic” or “natural.” From 2005 to 2008, there was an almost 65% increase in products using the words “simple” or “simplify” in the product or brand name. (Datamonitor) MORE…

A trio of beverage reports out this week all come from different sources, and consider different questions — but there’s a common thread that ties all of them together: obesity.

Two of the studies focus on carbonated soft drinks and other sugary beverages in our nation’s schools. The first compares deliveries of soda and full-sugar beverages to schools in 2004 to those this year. The numbers are down a whopping 95%. The ongoing initiative — headed up by the American Beverage Association (and big manufactures like Coke and Pepsi), the Clinton Foundation and the American Heart Association — has stressed 100% juice drinks, teas and flavored waters (though high school-age kids can additionally opt for diet drinks).

The program was introduced formally in 2006, in response to data showing that two-thirds of all Americans, including one in three children, have serious weight problems.

Against that backdrop, a second report unveiled at a heart disease convention this week shows that the increase in full-sugar beverage consumption has brought about 130,000 cases of diabetes and 14,000 cases of heart disease over the past decade.

The study’s lead author says that the greatest risk right now is to younger people, age 35 years and under.

“No one argues that these drinks are not fine in moderation, but over the past decade their consumption has been on the rise, while consumption of other beverages has declined,” Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, senior study author and an associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, was quoted as saying in a Reuters story. MORE…

When you’re the best, you’re always looking to get better.

Colorado currently has the lowest obesity rate of any state in the union. If you look at this map from the Centers for Disease Control, it’s the only state colored blue, indicating that less than 20% of the population (the exact number is 18.5% as of 2008) is obese. That’s pretty good, especially when compared to Deep South states like Alabama and Mississippi, which have obesity rates above 30%.

So you’d think the Rocky Mountain state could kick back, have a veggie burger, and bask in its relative healthfulness. Wrong. Citizens and advocacy groups are working hard to keep their state in fighting form, and even bring obesity rates down further.

One organization called LiveWell Colorado just today released a “Food Policy Blueprint” that’s impressive for its comprehensiveness, and gives a glimpse into why the state is flying high. It focuses specifically on access and policy issues, encouraging a system of subsidies and other incentives to encourage healthy retailing and farmers markets in underserved areas, as well in schools. That’s targeting the most affected and at-risk segment of the population, and it echoes the Obama administration’s recent announcement that it will spend $400 million to help eradicate food deserts. MORE…

With baseball season fast approaching, there’s a pressing issue that goes beyond pitchers and catchers, squeeze bunts and any postseason predictions you might have.

What are we going to do about the hot dog?

As you may have read recently, the American Academy of Pediatrics has called for a redesign of that most American of delicacies. Sure, a lot of us grew up eating them. They’ve long been a symbol of summer, the easy-to-grill, quick-to-eat meal that can get a little messy, okay — but what’s a little mustard around your mouth or in your seat? Well, there’s a bigger problem here. Hot dogs also pose a choking hazard, causing about 17% of food-related asphyxiations, according to the academy.

“If you were to find the best engineers in the world and ask them to design the perfect plug for a child’s airway, you couldn’t do much better than the hot dog,” Dr. Gary Smith, lead author of the AAP policy statement, told AOL News recently.

This isn’t a revelation. Of course hot dogs can get caught in your throat! So can a lot of foods. That’s why we’re taught to take small bites, and to chew thoroughly before swallowing. What’s next? Grapes? Popcorn? Actually, yes, and yes. The academy also called out foods like popcorn, grapes, nuts and raw carrots. MORE…

The FDA has sent out warning letters to 17 food manufacturers claiming that certain products violate the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. The development follows last October’s statement by FDA commissioner Margaret Hamburg urging companies to review their nutrition claims.

Yesterday’s letters serve as a reminder that the agency is serious about holding manufacturers accountable for the promises they make to their customers. The vast majority of companies making health claims have been careful to include studies, research findings and other data supporting their claims on their websites, or otherwise make them available to consumers.

Even so, the FDA is saying companies continue to overreach, or neglect to balance their claims with statements that point out other nutritional aspects that are not so healthy.

For example, many of the manufacturers on this most recent list were cited for making claims such as “0 grams of trans fat” – a statement that, in and of itself, is accurate. However, many of these products contain significant amounts of saturated (bad) fats, or cholesterol, or sodium. FDA regulations state that if these nutritional elements exceed a certain amount, then manufacturers must include an ancillary notice next to any front-panel health declarations that directs the consumer to the Nutrition Facts panel.

There, they’ll see that the product does not have any trans fats as stated but, Wow, it’s loaded with saturated fat, cholesterol or sodium. No thanks, I’ll pass. MORE…

Attempting to quantify the health-related costs associated with foodborne illness is, at best, an inexact science. There are so many variables to weigh. Some, like medical expenses and lost wages, are fairly obvious and easy to calculate. Research can reveal some pretty concrete numbers for those types of factors.

What about pain and suffering? Or the cost of financial burdens placed on a family whose primary wage-earner died as the result of a foodborne pathogen?

This “Big Picture” approach was taken with the new report: Health-Related Costs from Foodborne Illness in the United States (no mistaking the topic here, eh?). The study was authored by Robert Scharff, an assistant professor in the Department of Consumer Sciences at Ohio State University (and a former U.S. Food and Drug Administration economist). The report itself was sponsored by the Produce Safety Project at Georgetown University.

The most astounding revelation in this study is that Scharff came up with a new number for the cost of foodborne illness: $152 billion. What makes that figure such an eye-opener? Past official government estimates have topped only $35 billion.

“The cost of foodborne illness is significantly greater in this report than in some past studies, but only because this study included costs of all pathogens and a more comprehensive measure of economic cost,” wrote Scharff in the report. “It is my hope that the improvements made here will lead to better decision-making, both at the legislative and regulatory level.”

MORE…

Don’t ask me why, but 2015 has all of a sudden become the year for green transformations.

Last week, Wal-Mart said it plans to cut 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions from its supply chain by 2015. It will do this by going through stores category-by-category, rooting out the products responsible for the highest carbon output, and then working with suppliers to reduce the amounts. This could mean Wal-Mart’s vendors need to revisit how they source ingredients, the way they ship their products; changing whatever process is using the most energy.

The changes could be big, and manufacturers, many of whom have worked with the retailer on its packaging scorecard, may not be enthused about Wal-Mart calling the shots like this. But Wal-Mart argues, compellingly, that such changes would put them ahead of the regulatory curve and into consumers’ good graces.

“As we help our suppliers reduce their energy use, costs and carbon footprint, we’ll be helping our customers do the same thing,” said Wal-Mart CEO Mike Duke, in a statement.

The Bentonville retailer has made strides with this and other efforts to tame emissions — but it’s not the most ambitious company out there. That title arguably belongs to Great Britain’s Marks & Spencer, which announced today that it aims to become the world’s most sustainable retailer by 2015. MORE…

Here’s further proof that healthful eating can be the best medicine: An Ohio insurance company that’s shipping boxes of fresh produce to policyholders.

Medical Mutual, a Cleveland-based insurer that serves 1.6 million, started the promotion last month. Eligible customers sign up and pay $25 for each box of fresh fruits and vegetables that come from none other than The Chef’s Garden, the well-known grower in nearby Huron that supplies high-profile restaurants like New York City’s Aureole, and the French Laundry in California. A recent shipment described in a Plain-Dealer story included red fingerling potatoes, candy-striped beets and baby bok choy.

So recipients get great-tasting produce, and they throw in their lot with sustainable agriculture, the guiding principle behind how The Chefs Garden farms its 260 acres.

There’s just one complaint, and it crops up a few times in the comments section of the Plain-Dealer article. Apparently the boxes are pretty small. “Tons of packing, very little produce. We didn’t even have enough greens to make 2 salads,” wrote one disgruntled customer.

Sadly, eating healthy is expensive, and buying from a boutique grower doesn’t help matters much. But there’s no discouraging the principle behind this story — that preventive care through healthful eating is gaining momentum. And sourcing from local farms is icing on the cake. MORE…

It took five years of on-and-off sparring, but organic supporters are raising a nice, tall glass of organic milk after the U.S. Department of Agriculture issued revised rules governing the “access to pasture” guidelines contained within the National Organic Program.

Mark Kastel, co-founder of the Cornucopia Institute, a small farm advocacy group and one of the most vocal critics of the original regulations, was quoted in our print issue of SN as saying, “Flashing forward to a year from now, when this rule will be fully in place and enforced, we hope to be able to say that 100% of the name brands and private labels all meet the rigorous standards that consumers expect” from the USDA-certified organic label.

There are two reasons everyone is pleased. The first one, of course, is that the rule was changed. Starting in June, the USDA’s revised access to pasture regulation will require farmers to allow their cows to graze at least 120 days per year, and the cows must also get at least 30% of their food from pasture during the local grazing season. The old version simply — and vaguely — required “access to pasture,” with no further specifications as to how much or when.

Critics of the old rule claimed that large-scale dairies were taking advantage of the hazy wording to circumvent the spirit of the regulations but still calling their dairy products certified organic. Groups like the Cornucopia Institute and the Organic Consumers Association were tenacious in petitioning the USDA for investigations of specific big dairy operators and filing lawsuits. MORE…