For one thing, it reinforces the 'five a day' message in the minds of shoppers. While eating a decent amount of fruit 'n' veg may be good for you (and I certainly feel better when I do), it's yet another nanny state intervention in my life, which I can well do without. It reminds me of the daily alcohol limits which were comprehensively debunked in 2007 when a member of the RCP working party that produced it admitted that the figures were plucked from thin air because they felt they "had to say something". Oh, and the 'red wine is
For another, it's a blatant attempt to get you to buy more stuff. After all, an apple could be reasonably judged to he a 'handful', but what about peas? Could you imagine eating a whole handful of peas (look at the amount of grapes in the picture)? Or sweetcorn? You wouldn't be seen for a week. It's an upsell, pure and simple.
But the thing that really grips my spleen is that one word ...
"Well ..."
Supermarkets can't just sell you stuff you need any more; they have to be your best mate, too. They think a conversational tone is more likely to break down your suspicion that you are in a temple to capitalism whose only purpose is to part you from ever more substantial amounts of your cash. That's what supermarkets are, and nothing wrong with that, so why try to mask it in fawning chumminess? (Even worse are those 'hip' internet sites that don't display error messages, but give you things like 'Oops, we goofed! Hey, no-one's perfect, right?')
Actually, it's more than that, because the tone isn't matey at all. It's the voice of a primary teacher explaining something to a dim six-year-old.
"Why do I have to wear my wellies to go out and play?"
"Well ..."
I got heartily sick of that tone of voice when I was about ten. I do not want to hear it again, now that both my parents are dead and I have grown-up children, thank you very much.
