Diet Fail: Attempting to Subtract by Adding....

I saw this today at the local convenience store:



My first reaction was "Are people really that stupid?" Then 7 out of the next 8 people I see are a heart attack waiting to happen. So I guess then answer is: "YES".

The box has on the front cover "20% Daily Value of Fiber" in big letters. That is awesome. (Well really, it is not that awesome.) Look at what else is on the box:
* 6g of fat. And I will be willing to bet that this isn't the heart healthy oils that come from naturally occurring plants, nuts, and legumes. It is the artery-clogging, zit-forming, poop-floating, ass-forming kind of fat.
* Look at the flavor, Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon. First, Kellogg's is too lazy to make a real flavor. I would love to have been in whatever corporate meeting was responsible for this flavor.
- Product Director: Hey, we got the fiber in there, what flavor should we make it.

- Budget Director: I think we already went over budget getting the fiber in there, lets not get too fancy with the flavors.

- Marketing Intern: I know, we will just market the heck out of the fact that it has fiber in it. Fiber is really popular these days. I read about it all the time in Weight Watchers and The Biggest Loser.

- "Make It Happen" Manager: Well, we got to think of "something" to put in there.

- Project Manager: We really got to fast-track this thing, lets rein in the project scope. We can save resources in schedule if we just put brown sugar in there.

- PR Manager: We can't just take some fiber and put sugar inside it. Why don't we just add some cinnamon and call it a day.

- Project Manager: Does everyone agree with that?

- All: Yes

- Project Manager: OK, we have made a collective decision to make the flavor "Brown Sugar Cinnamon". I will fill out the change request and distribute.

- Product Manager: I have an issue - I don't think that a Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop Tart is going to be sweet enough. What do we do?

- Marketing Intern: Why don't we do the same thing we do with many other Pop Tarts, put frosting on it.

- Manager of Corporate Branding: Well, that sounds good. What do we call it -- I know: Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon.

This is how we get such crap products as "High Fiber Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop Tarts". Hopefully, there are some lessons learned here.

1) You fix a bad diet by adding something good. Adding 4.4g of fiber is not going to fix the fact that they Pop Tart will jack up your blood sugar. (Attempting to "Subtract" by "Adding" to your diet).

2) Food manufacturers start with the health concept, then add the feature that are mostly unhealthy to give them appeal. Understand EVERYTHING that you are putting into your body. If you are focused on only one aspect of your diet, chances are you will screw everything else up.

3) Read the small print. Fiber was in big letters. Fat was is slightly smaller letters. Brown Sugar even smaller. Frosted even smaller than that. They all count.