Follow-Up on Manwich

Up early, good exercise and some time this morning reading comments on yesterday's redux blog on Manwich led me to see if there were any updates on the ConAgra website since they didn't have nutritional information when last I checked. Goodness... are we going to have fun with this for a few days!

Yes, ConAgra has updated and launched a new site for Product Nutrition information. Excellent, I thought. I will go and search for Manwich and see what I can find. Should be easy, right? ConAgra would want their consumers to quickly find the information they are seeking, right? Ha!

I would consider myself a pretty savvy web user and... this is one of the most confusing, difficult-to-use search features I've ever encountered. For the record, the idea of the web is to make it easy for people to find what they are looking for. Can I just have a search box to type in Manwich and get the nutritional information? No! 

When I tried the search box and entered Manwich, I did get a nifty news release on the Investor Relations page that talks about the release of the "full serving of vegetables" campaign and says: 

• "new television advertising campaign promoting the full serving of vegetables found in each serving of Manwich"
• "mark Manwich’s first new creative campaign in three years"
• "new strategic message requires a deeper communication with the target consumer"
• "promoting the full serving of vegetables strategic messaging and encouraging moms to feel good about serving Manwich to their families more frequently"
• "lighthearted spots feature a young girl who is dressed as a Manwich for a school play while her classmates are dressed as vegetables. She touts the wholesomeness of Manwich to her classmates and family."

Excuse me? This a strategic message to encourage Moms to feel good about serving Manwich? How about a strategic message to help Moms understand what is healthy and good for their family? How about a commercial with only the vegetables on stage? 

There are so many things wrong with this, I don't even know where to begin. Discuss and share. Until we get together and point out the absurdity of such things the people who need good and honest advice the most will continue to be subjected to "strategic messages."

Tomorrow? An experiment in actually using ConAgra's Product Nutrition Search. Stay tuned!!!