McDonalds Ads - tell us how do you feel about them folks?

Btw, before you come back at me, my children are 7 and 10 so the pizza on the piccolo menu is not big enough for them.

I think this is something else we conveniently forget in Mumsnetland. That not all parents are the parents of babies and toddlers.

'McDonalds is sooo UnMumsnet!'

there lies the truth ....right there

Mila - I go to Pizza Express at least once every couple of months. I know what is on the menu there and it is not all low fat/salt/sugar. You can easily tot up as many calories as you would with a McD's Happy Meal.

I wouldn't have any objection.

Brand me a snob if you like

McDonalds is sooo UnMumsnet!

Have you even looked at the Pizza Express menu Bibboty?

They don't even have fries or fried food on the menu. The menu is groaning with salads,weight watchers pizzas and the entire menu is thin pizza, pasta,anti pasta and salad not fries and crappy fried meat(with very little else). You'd find it very easy to have a healthy meal at PE but bloody difficult at McD-that's the difference.

I fail to see how you can label anybody as a snob when you haven't even met them.

yes we're all snobs

I think UsualSuspect makes an excellent point. There certainly is a huge element of snobbery on this issue. It is perfectly easy to eat a more calorific and unhealthy meal at Pizza Express than at Macdonalds.

No, their credentials do not bear scrutiny, as a company. But this is true of almost any global corporation.

Thats total utter rubbish Usual and unfair Amum.

Pizza Express isn't fast food at all thats the whole point. You can't nip in and out and it's bloody expensive. You'd be in there an hour and a half minimum if you were lucky on a weekend. While you're waiting kids can actually have a conversation and experience a restaurant setting. Also the food is sooooo much healthier and fresher. I've read several articles analysing fast food and KFC always come out worse,pizza the best as the majority of it is bread.

Pizza Express pizza on it's kids menu is tiny and thin,it's basically a teeny bit of dough with tomato sauce and kids can choose plenty of healthy things like mushrooms,olives etc to put on top. The most unhealthy thing you can have on it is about 3 teeny slices of pepperoni. With a sprinkling of mozzarella is practically no different to a cheese sandwich. The 3 teeny dough balls always come with a bit of salad.Thats assuming said kids don't have pasta. There is a huge menu filled with healthy options if one prefers. The 2 or 3 times I've been to McD I struggled to find anything remotely healthy I'd want to eat so I went without. Not so PE,it's very easy to have a healthy meal there.

To call me a snob is completely unfair,you don't know me and the fact remains I don't go either establishments as PE is out of my price range on a regular basis and I'd rather eat my own hair than feed my kids the shite McD serves on a regular basis.

OK, it's all getting pretty repetitive I reckon MN needs to set up a proper consultation for all of us on what categories we have issues with, rather than starting a thread like this, if they want to know properly what we think. Then we can each put our votes in for what we think is ok and what isn't, one set of answers per person, and they can publish the answers in some kind of order, and either base a strategy on it or ignore it as they choose!

look, im not being funny but i will just end up repeating myself and winding myself up on this thread now.

my arguments are already posted.

What on earth has "kids gathering together" got to do with it?

Teens seem to gather a fair bit in Starbucks round here, at least as much as in McDonalds, for some reason. Or Subway - yuck!

Were Morris & Steel being snobs?

but kids don't all gather together in pizza express do they? anyway am just repeating myself now - it's nothing to do with snobbery

usualsuspect - I think that's exactly it. It's easy to picture "nice" families in there, eating properly with a knife and fork, having a pizza as a treat, even though mummy normally gives them home-made healthy meals. So of course it can be part of a healthy diet and lifestyle. Not like nasty old McDonalds in the slightest, which is full of people who don't know any better. Sobbery, tbh.

If MN do decide to have a policy on ads, I would hope that high fat foods marketed at children would be treated on an equal basis - allow both or neither, but don't say one's ok because it meets a cosy demographic, and demonise the other.

You can justify pizza express all you like ..but the bottom line is ,its more up market than McDonalds thats why it wasn't moaned about

[resolves to finally get ad blocker]

I do think McD is different from Boden,Centre Parks and Warners all of which I couldn't afford in a million years not so McD.McD is sooo very affordable which is half the problem.

Pizza Express is different too as again it's not affordable to most(we only go about twice a year courtesy off Tesco),it's a proper restaurant setting and there are plenty of healthy options to choose from-it's real food. There are no bribary toys and the kids menu includes a tiny thin pizza or pasta and doughballs which come with salad.A happy meal has a fruit bag option big wooop ,I know no kid that would choose a fruit bag over fries and the entire remaining meal is made up of fried food.

Having a McD advert on here sends out very bad messages that serving burger and fries on a regular basis is just great,healthy in fact when it bloody isn't. You could cook home made burgers with your finest 100% organic beef and fries and it should still be an occasional treat.

Having burger and fries adverts on here goes beyond mums buying it in McD outlets it endorses serving up chicken nuggets,burgers etc regularly at home too. Who knows what codswallop McD want to display.

This thread isn't a ballot it's just a conversation and like others I'm a bit that mn posed the question then buggared off.I really hope mn know themselves what the right decision is(if ads on here were a possibility)and think beyond the big buck. Mn has grown and rightly or wrongly it's decisions and points of view in many areas of parenting are now going to be scrutinised.

So MN wanto renege on their own policy as posted by Himalaya re. not accepting advertising from McD's?? How odd. Where are they going to stop? Soon they'll be asking our opinions on them accepting ad's for cosmetic surgery.

Boo to you, MN.

Or it's all been a ploy to take the temperature of their demographic.. Whatever, I suggest they inform us pretty soon instead of sitting back and watching the sparks fly. This must've been entertaining for them in MN towers.

i feel sad that we could have lost a great poster because of it :(

My excellent point referred to Becauseimworthit and the fact we've done excellent market research FREE

Personally, I wouldn't be thrilled as they really do sell a load of fat and salt laden junk which is bad for kids. But I agree that like a lot of other posters I filter out the ads anyway (likelihood of me being able to afford a Mark Warner holiday/Boden wardrobe/GLTC whatever anytime soon............? )

Actually, I am never going to respond again on an mnhq thread asking for our opinions unless they say exactly why they are asking and give enough context.

Yes, BiWi, I am a tad concerned about that too. It is like when Mnhq got a huge free chunk of market research from a thread they started about women's role in family car-purchase. The big contract with Ford came soon after.

I also wondered whether the op might be based on a query, not from an advertiser, but from some other party altogether -- journailist or whatever. It would be good to know. Best to give as much info as possible when asking for our input IMO, otherwise posters risk serving ends they would rather not.