America's Most Junk Food-Obsessed Cities
America's Most Junk Food-Obsessed Cities - MSN Health & Fitness - Nutrition
Craving a Twix bar? If you live in Oklahoma City, chances are you're in good company.
It tops our list of American cities with residents that buy the most junk food per capita. Pittsburgh, Memphis, Tenn., Little Rock, Ark., and St. Louis round out the top five.
To find others-- Minneapolis, Minn., Milwaukee, Wis., Birmingham, Ala., Indianapolis and Nashville, Tenn., among them--we consulted data provided by The Nielsen Company, a New York-based market research firm.
The data covers 52 Nielsen Scantrack markets for the year ending March 22, 2008. It ranks each market by Category Development Index (CDI), which is the percentage of category sales in a market divided by the percentage of all commodity volume for a market, times 100. An index between 80 and 120 is generally considered average. An index of 120 or more is above average for a market its size. An index of 80 or less is below average for a market its size.
Each market includes supermarkets in the area with $2 million and over in sales. Each Scantrack market area covers a designated number of counties. The average number of counties in a Scantrack market is 30, with the range being 1 to 79. In general, market definitions are created by considering retailer warehousing patterns, manufacturer sales districts and television market coverage. All markets include central city, suburban and rural areas.
Here, the data is broken down into eight categories--cookies, ice cream, frankfurters, carbonated sugar drinks, candy, snacks (including chips and pretzels), pizza and bakery goods (including donuts and cake). We averaged the CDI rankings of these categories to find one comprehensive list of cities that are the most junk food-obsessed.
Behind The Numbers
Of the 52 markets tracked, the top five was comprised of cities in the Midwest and South.
Pittsburghers, for example, scream for ice cream. This city was rated No. 1 in the category, with a CDI of 142. Oklahoma City ranked in the top 10 of all eight categories surveyed. Folks in the area like all sorts of junk food, but they're particularly keen on snacks like potato chips and pretzels, as well as cookies and ice cream. In these categories, the market ranked Nos. 1, 2 and 2, respectively. Eating habits like these might be contributing to the city's 27.5% obesity rate.
It's difficult to know why one region would prefer a particular food over another. Steve Witherly, Ph.D., a nutritionist and author of Why Humans Like Junk Food, says ethnicity, historicity and weather all contribute. He says a high Caucasian population in the Midwest speaks to the popularity of milk-based foods.
"Ice cream is more popular with Caucasians because most are not lactose intolerant," he says. "Most Asians, blacks and Latinos have a problem with lactose. And in the Midwest, long winters encourage overeating."
In places like Birmingham, Ala., Witherly says that junk foods--like hot dogs--are popular with people who are less active because they're convenient. It takes significantly less time to fry a frankfurter than to bake a chicken, which may contribute to Birmingham's second-highest obesity rate in the country.
"It's generally thought by nutritionists that the two coasts have people who are lower in body weight than the nation's middle," he says. "In school, we called the Bible Belt the Blubber Belt."
But areas struggling with poor nutrition and obesity aren't sitting on their boxes of Krispy Kremes, waiting to keel over. Most states have implemented nutrition improvements in public schools. To encourage youth to develop proper eating habits, for example, certain elementary schools in St. Louis have prohibited vending machines, grills and fryers. And in October 2007, the East Syracuse-Minoa school district in Syracuse, N.Y., went so far as to ban candy, cupcakes and other treats from the Halloween parties in its schools.
These improvements may encourage better eating habits, but Harry Balzer, vice president of market research firm The NPD Group, who has studied eating habits of humans for 30 years, says that many resist such changes.
Despite the fact that the Calorie Control Council--an international non-profit association representing the low-calorie and reduced-fat food and beverage industry--says that 29% of adults in the country are on a diet, the country is gaining weight.
Since 1980, the number of obese adults in the United States has doubled, and an estimated $120 billion per year is spent combating obesity-related ailments, such as heart disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"Instead of changing our eating habits, we just eat the better version of the thing you shouldn't be eating, instead of not eating it at all," says Balzer. "Until manufacturers find a way to keep healthy food, like fruit, fresh and easy to transport, convenience will always trump nutrition."
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Originally Posted by FritterGirl
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