Taco Bell will discontinue kids meals from next year across the U.S., the company announced Monday.
"The future of Taco Bell is not about kids meal. This is about positioning the brand for Millennials," Greg Creed, Taco Bell CEO, said.
The decision comes after much pressure by parents and children health groups to keep a check on the nutrition on kids meal. Last year, a judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by the Center for Science in Public Interest against McDonald's for "deceptive marketing" with the toys in its Happy Meals, reported USA Today.
"It's a constructive step forward that Taco Bell will no longer use toys to encourage kids to pester their parents to go to their restaurants," said Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy at the CSPI. "By constantly churning out new toys, fast-food chains have a new angle every six to eight weeks for marketing to kids."
Taco Bell will be the first fast-food restaurant chain to drop kids' meal from its menu. According to the Federal Trade Commission data, the industry sells more than 1.2 billion such meals annually in the country.
Children will miss out on a meal of Crunchy Taco, Cinnamon Twists and a small beverage, which cost about $2.84 in most markets. If the children buy these items separately once the meals are stopped, they will have to shell out $3.17.
The FTC report said that these restaurants spend nearly $580 million every year to market the children's meal. Of this, $340 million is spent on the licensing and production of toys.
Creed maintains that the sales have nothing to do with the plan of dropping the kids' meal because it accounts for half of 1 percent of Taco Bell's overall sales."It's fairly inconsistent for an edgy, twenty something brand to offer kids meals," he said. The company did not advertise their kiddy meal for the past several years, he added.
He also said that children will not force their parents to buy a meal for them because they would not get any toys. "It's not that we don't like kids," he says. "We're empowering parents," concluded Creed.
