Day 013 - 19 Jul 94 - Page 21


     
     1
         Q.   I accept you were not at this meeting but, surely, you
     2        would have been aware of criticisms, would you not?
              A.  I am aware of criticisms both in my official capacity
     3        and I read the newspaper, yes.
 
     4   Q.   And criticisms relating to health and/or the nutritional
              value of McDonald's products?
     5        A.  Yes, in general terms, yes.
 
     6   Q.   I think we did refer to the letter earlier from the New
              York Attorney General about the Chicken McNuggetts
     7        advertisement where he was talking about consumers being
              concerned about the links between cancer and heart disease
     8        and diet?
              A.  Yes.
     9
         Q.   "We cannot at this stage of the situation really address
    10        or defend nutrition.  We do not sell nutrition and people
              do not come to McDonald's for nutrition."   Why cannot
    11        McDonald's address nutrition?
              A.  Well, these sentences you are taking are out of the
    12        context of the entire document, in my opinion, as I have
              read it.  This is at the very beginning stages.  This is
    13        before we formulated a plan.  This is before we started
              doing our advertising and discussing things such as
    14        balance and other things that we stressed in our
              advertising; and I think that is the point of this, that
    15        it is an early stage.  There are suggestions here about
              what we should be doing.
    16
         Q.   Why can you not address nutrition?
    17        A.  I thought my last response was the answer to that.
              That is, that we had not developed a plan yet and
    18        established a basis by which we could address this
              particular topic.
    19
         Q.   So you are saying you could not address nutrition because
    20        you had not worked out your line on it?
              A.  That is correct.
    21
         Q.   What about the next part:  "We do not sell nutrition and
    22        people do not come to McDonald's for nutrition"?
              A.  We are not a health store.  We do not say:  "Come eat
    23        our healthy product, all the, you know, vitamin A you need
              for the day" by eating this particular product.  That is
    24        not what we do.  I mean, if you read the following
              sections, A, B, C and D, they go on to indicate that we do
    25        not want people, we do not stress that people eat here
              every one of their meals.  There is a time and place for 
    26        everything and balance makes sense. 
  
    27   MR. MORRIS:  Just on the memo, it is true, is it not, that
              people do not go to McDonald's for nutrition, as it says
    28        in this memo?
 
    29   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Can you answer that question?
 
    30   MR. MORRIS:  He may be able to.
 

Prev Next Index