A Swipe at the Big Bucks … Nickels Against Obesity

Everyone thinks that good thumb tactics and money transfers from a PayPal of some sort are the real depth of technology’s reach into the future of fundraising. But I disagree. Instead, I believe that with some innovative thinking it will become possible for socially responsible thinkers and doers to tap directly into the lifeline of business—the swipe-activated purchasing power we give businesses to reach daily into our personal bank accounts.

How often now do we swipe our bank or credit cards to buy fast food, gas, groceries, gifts, or anything and everything else? Even both big and very small transactions?

So often, in fact, that we barely think of the phenomenon impact this capability has had on growing the very large corporations we both rely on and find fault with. Arguably, the growth of mega-hundred-million dollar businesses from our past into mega-billion-dollar behemoths might well be directly tied to this seemingly simple cash access and transfer process.

Which is why I developed what I believe is the first fundraising initiative designed to tap directly into this stream of money because of what that capability offers for dramatically and fundamentally enhancing the voice and therefore the power of the typical daily consumer of fast or other unhealthy foods!

This is the essence of the Nickel-a-Meal Campaign Against Obesity, which can be seen at Nickel-a-Meal.info. By simply convincing the fast food and the credit/ATM processing  sectors to partner together to allow us all to voluntarily contribute an extra nickel with each “Value” or “Super-sized” meal we buy with a swipe, we would create a massive funding stream of food empowerment donations as big or even bigger than the nation’s weight problem!

Just imagine what might happen if this reach into the $200 billion annual fast food money flow achieved its potential? We could in theory generate 110,000,000 nickels to be used to build proactive local anti-obesity strategies … and that, by the way, is 110,000,000 nickels EVERY SINGLE DAY OF THE YEAR!

One of the reasons that even the best of collaborative projects fail is because over time their fundraising abilities fall off. Governments cut funding, private philanthropy moves on, people get tired of giving without seeing many results, and definitely without knowing whether their gift accomplishes anything.

For the first time with the Nickel-a-Meal Campaign we can build in a never-ending roll of nickels that keeps getting bigger even as we fix the core problem. The initial nickel amounts would be incredible, but as the food businesses learned that it would be to their bottom line benefit to encourage more selling of better foods, their profits would grow too … and for the first time the attraction of this sector would not be about the damage we are doing to ourselves, our kids, our families or our communities.

We could literally fund everything we needed to do to engage a well developed food revolution, thank you Jamie Oliver!

A recent report to the president of the United States by the Task Force on Childhood Obesity demonstrates that past food marketing initiatives instituted by the fast food companies have done little to meet their standards. It turns out that they promised to stop using carton or other character icons aimed at children, when in fact they nearly doubled these types of promotional activities. (See page 28 of the report, which is downloadable at LetsMove.gov.)

And now Michelle Obama’s efforts are proud of the commitment of other food companies to reduce our calories by 1.5 trillion in a few years … partially by packaging healthier foods and by reducing the size of portions (though there is no indication that we will be charged less!).

Imagine what could happen if with every purchase we make … over and over and over again … we know we are providing five pennies worth of healthy advice to the fast food companies?

There would simply be no way for the food industry to not learn to be responsive … and all because of our desire to swipe our way into a much more convenient future of really large amounts of dollars, dimes and even nickels for all kinds of causes.

The Nickel-a-Meal Campaign is just beginning. And I’m actively advice and suggestions on how to get the food and credit/ATM card businesses to play along voluntarily so we can all progress together. Feel free to email thoughts, ideas, contacts, etc. to Nickel.a.Meal@gmail.com or comment right here.

Guaranteed, your few cents of advice will be heard!

110,000,000 and rolling

If a Nickel-a-Meal Campaign gets rolling and involves the fast food sector, we could raise 110,000,000 nickels against obesity every single day for each and every year. And that’s probably before the world gets involved! Imagine the difference.

Pushing Private Philanthropy

One of the better private charitable efforts to challenge obesity is being organized by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. However, like many other efforts that seek to do something fast, they often put together initiatives that are not as dramatic or innovative as they might be.

After being asked in their email newsletters about making a suggestion, I forwarded the following comment to them to see what might result. I’m looking forward to their response!

Dear Tracy at ReverseChildhoodObesity.org:

I haven’t garnered a lot of interest yet from those invested in the anti-obesity action sector, but I continue to be concerned about the future of efforts when funding and empowerment are not really given their critical due. This was why I came upon the idea several years ago about creating a different approach–one centered on using involvement, engagement and funding by truly forging a new relationship between consumers and the food sector (and particularly the fast food sector). I call the project the Nickel-a-Meal Campaign Against Obesity and it centers on having food outlets voluntarily collect an extra nickel with each purchase. They would do this by working in partnership with the credit/ATM card industry, which has the ability to automatically ad the nickel upon qualified purchases. These nickels would then be immediately and continously transferred to local or regional nonprofits or even economic develop agencies earmarked for food empowerment projects.

The possibilities are amazing! Customers would connect action with their food-buying activities. Smart businesses would be able to and may even be forced to respond to the daily reminder of their customers that it is necessary to come up with fast, affordable, diverse, good and fun food that is actually healthy.

Just a simple calculation suggests that if the fast food sector got into the game, we could generate 110,000,000 nickels against obesity EVERY SINGLE DAY of the year … and it will grow as people become more satisfied with better eats!

I’d really like to see a private foundation like you folks give serious consideration to this model. It is grounded in the very types of empowerment philosophies you have been funding for years, particularly those focused on youth and technology projects. Unfortunately, we really don’t see much of this kind of thinking in the rush to make it look like we are doing something.

People who eat poor foods and don’t exercise enough are NOT the only factor behind the obesity epidemic. Successful marketing and promotions play a major role too, which is why Ronald McWhichever is always so well known. With a Nickel-a-Meal Campaign we can harness this reality and make it work effectively for demonstrable FOOD Change!

You can see my idea at http://Nickel-a-Meal.info. Why not see about having someone write a concept paper? Or have your organization fund a process for exploring some truly original ideas?

Thanks.

Nickel Talk – Promotions Against Obesity

Welcome to Nickel Talk, our interactive space to talk all-things about food empowerment solutions against obesity.

We know that exercise is important to stay in shape. So is good nutrition. But food is a social, family and cultural phenomenon too. Heart attacks and diabetes came about mostly because the food industry created processed foods that do more damage than good.

But just attacking the corporate world for being profit oriented won’t help us make the food sector and particularly the fast food industry better. What is needed are incentives for convincing them that there are solutions that do good things for them and for us (including our waist lines!)

The Nickel-a-Meal Campaign does this by using two smart and technology advancements to get money and ideas on our side.

Find out more by going to our website, Nickel-a-Meal.info. Or contribute here to the discussion. The Nickel Campaign is mostly about generating dollars. Your contribution is to make sure that the nickels you give go to great empowerment initiatives for your local community, our nation and potentially the world before fast food takes over!