How the Egg Lobby Paid Food Blogs and Targeted Chef to Crush a Vegan Startup - GoFuckYourself.com

wehateporn · 09-09-2015, 08:41 AM

Internal emails reveal coordinated attack by American Egg Board to quash the rise of Hampton Creek?s egg alternative in possible breach of federal regulations

A government-controlled industry group targeted popular food bloggers, major publications and a celebrity chef as part of its sweeping effort to combat a perceived threat from an egg-replacement startup backed by some of Silicon Valley?s biggest names, the Guardian can reveal.
The lobbyists? media counterattack, in possible violation of US department of agriculture rules, was coordinated by a marketing arm of the egg industry called the American Egg Board (AEB). It arose after AEB chief executive Joanne Ivy identified the fledgling technology startup Hampton Creek as a ?crisis and major threat to the future? of the $5.5bn-a-year egg market.

A detailed review of emails, sent from inside the AEB and obtained by the Guardian, shows that the lobbyist?s anti-Hampton Creek campaign sought to:

- Pay food bloggers as much as $2,500 a post to write online recipes and stories about the virtue of eggs that repeated the egg lobby group?s ?key messages?

- Confront Andrew Zimmern, who had featured Hampton Creek on his popular Travel Channel show Bizarre Foods and praised the company in a blog post characterized by top egg board executives as a ?love letter?

- Target publications including Forbes and Buzzfeed that had written broadly positive articles about a Silicon Valley darling

- Unsuccessfully tried to recruit both the animal rights and autism activist Temple Grandin and the bestselling author and blogger Ree Drummond to publicly support the egg industry

- Buy Google advertisements to show AEB-sponsored content when people searched for Hampton Creek or its founder Josh Tetrick

Continued How the Egg Lobby Paid Food Blogs and Targeted Chef to Crush a Vegan Startup | Alternet

09-09-2015, 08:41 AM	#1
wehateporn Promoting Debate on GFY Industry Role: Join Date: Apr 2007 Posts: 27,173	How the Egg Lobby Paid Food Blogs and Targeted Chef to Crush a Vegan Startup Internal emails reveal coordinated attack by American Egg Board to quash the rise of Hampton Creek?s egg alternative in possible breach of federal regulations A government-controlled industry group targeted popular food bloggers, major publications and a celebrity chef as part of its sweeping effort to combat a perceived threat from an egg-replacement startup backed by some of Silicon Valley?s biggest names, the Guardian can reveal. The lobbyists? media counterattack, in possible violation of US department of agriculture rules, was coordinated by a marketing arm of the egg industry called the American Egg Board (AEB). It arose after AEB chief executive Joanne Ivy identified the fledgling technology startup Hampton Creek as a ?crisis and major threat to the future? of the $5.5bn-a-year egg market. A detailed review of emails, sent from inside the AEB and obtained by the Guardian, shows that the lobbyist?s anti-Hampton Creek campaign sought to: - Pay food bloggers as much as $2,500 a post to write online recipes and stories about the virtue of eggs that repeated the egg lobby group?s ?key messages? - Confront Andrew Zimmern, who had featured Hampton Creek on his popular Travel Channel show Bizarre Foods and praised the company in a blog post characterized by top egg board executives as a ?love letter? - Target publications including Forbes and Buzzfeed that had written broadly positive articles about a Silicon Valley darling - Unsuccessfully tried to recruit both the animal rights and autism activist Temple Grandin and the bestselling author and blogger Ree Drummond to publicly support the egg industry - Buy Google advertisements to show AEB-sponsored content when people searched for Hampton Creek or its founder Josh Tetrick Continued How the Egg Lobby Paid Food Blogs and Targeted Chef to Crush a Vegan Startup \| Alternet __________________ Sexy Girls Teasing