Make a long comments about the two eassies I attached. One comment for each.

                It can be hard to wake up in the morning and find the time to make breakfast. Cereal is often a popular breakfast choice due to its convenience and affordability. With a vast variety of flavors and brands, cereal can suit just about anyone’s taste. Most cereals claim to have added benefits and sources of nutrients, but just what is packaged into those brightly colored boxes?    

                Every grocery store seems to have an entire aisle designated to cereal and other breakfast foods. With so many choices of brands and sizes, the average box of cereal usually costs $2 to $6. One of my favorite brands of cereal to buy is Cheerios because there are so many different flavors and the price is pretty reasonable at $3 or $4 a box. Boxes typically come in sizes between 12 and 27 ounces. I like to be health conscientious about the food I eat, so I chose Cheerios Protein. This box retails at $3.58 for a 14.1oz box. I was first drawn to this product because of the bright yellow packaging and the big, bolded word “protein” printed across the box in an earthy brown color. According to Color Matters, the color yellow is meant to be bright and stick out to get your attention. It is often associated with happiness or energy, fitting for a product promoting protein as a great source of energy. In a study done by Empower Yourself, brown is seen as natural, earthy, and comfortable, which appeals to people like me who want to feel as if they are eating something healthy or natural. The colors chosen were not done by accident, but rather were meant to grab your attention and make you feel good about what you are eating.  

               Cheerios also tries to appeal to customers by placing all of the good nutritional facts on the front of the box, while amounts of sugar (17 grams) and sodium (280 mg) can only be found on the side of the box in much smaller print. The calorie amount printed on the front does not take into consideration how many calories there would be if milk was added. This could cause some deception for people who do not read the box in its entirety or look at the complete nutritional facts on the side of the box. In my opinion, Cheerios does this as a way to draw your attention to the good while getting you to ignore or overlook the bad.  

                Another popular breakfast cereal is Lucky Charms, which is priced at $3.98 for a 20.5oz box. This cereal is marketed more towards kids. The box is mostly red with pictures of different charms that are every color of the rainbow. In the Color Matters study, red is proven to make people feel hungry and is also seen as an adventurous and magical color, which is fitting for a cereal that portrays a leprechaun trying to collect all of the charms. The cereal targets kids by the use of the bright colors and the leprechaun cartoon character on every box. Even the shape and color of the marshmallows targets kids to want to try it because they see it as a “fun” cereal. Certain boxes will often advertise prizes to be found inside as an attempt to catch children’s attention as well.

                Of course kids themselves are not buying the cereal, in which case Lucky Charms must appeal to the parents. They do this by highlighting nutritional facts on the front of the box. Like Cheerios, Lucky Charms makes words like “whole grain” in big yellow font to draw your eyes to it, while they print the sugar content in smaller, less noticeable black lettering. The cereal does contain some vitamins, however; they are very minute. Again, the cereal makers are drawing your attention away from the bad by pointing out the good.

               Cereal companies advertise their product the same way that any other company in the market would. They use colors to catch the customer’s attention, list added benefits, and try to get people to overlook any negatives about the product. Cereal companies, such as Cheerios and Lucky Charms, are so successful because they know who their target markets are, and are therefore, able to create many varieties of cereal to satisfy all of their customers. It obviously works, otherwise we would not have an entire aisle of cereal in every grocery store.