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Eating Lab

Many of today’s unhealthy foods were brought to you by Big Tobacco

A new study suggests that tobacco companies, who were skilled at marketing cigarettes, used similar strategies to hook people on processed foods.

By
September 19, 2023 at 6:00 a.m. EDT
A photo illustration of a cigarette on a red background. The smoke from the cigarette is partially covering Kool Aid packets, Lunchables and Teddy Grahams.
(Washington Post illustration/iStock)
10 min

For decades, tobacco companies hooked people on cigarettes by making their products more addictive. Now, a new study suggests that tobacco companies may have used a similar strategy to hook people on processed foods.

In the 1980s, tobacco giants Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds acquired the major food companies Kraft, General Foods and Nabisco, allowing tobacco firms to dominate America’s food supply and reap billions in sales from popular brands such as Oreo cookies, Kraft Macaroni & Cheese and Lunchables.