Podesta Group

Imagine if a working group of four federal agencies issued a set of “voluntary” guidelines that could drastically change how your industry does business. Surely, you’d want to know how to gain a seat at the policymaking table.

For the food industry – and allied industries including retail, advertising and broadcasting – this challenge is very real. The persistent debate about proposed voluntary guidelines for marketing food to children and teenagers would greatly alter their current way of doing business. The experience of these industries offers important lessons for any company confronting questions of social responsibility.

Urgent national challenges are at stake with the children’s nutrition guidelines debate. Growing numbers of American children are overweight, and many are dangerously obese. These problems are serious, but the guidelines have been controversial, as has process that produced them.

On principle, the debate has been a bipartisan one. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) and former Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS) inserted a provision in the 2009 omnibus spending bill calling for an interagency study on the marketing of food to children. Four federal agencies – the US Department of Agriculture, Federal Trade Commission, Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – were directed to conduct a study and develop recommendations for Congress on standards for marketing food to children and teenagers.

However, some critics contend that the interagency working group went too far and produced restrictive guidelines to the food industry. They argue that the guidelines could prevent food manufacturers from advertising even some healthy foods.

Many of the recommendations encourage what most would agree are smart nutritional principles, but other elements of the guidelines were questioned by the food industry and by Senate and House members from both parties, including the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI).

With thousands of public and industry comments submitted to the various agencies, including many calling for further study of the guidelines’ impact and two House Energy and Commerce subcommittees holding a joint hearing last month, the interagency working group seems to be poised to scale back the guidelines.

But, the debates and decisions about food-marketing guidelines will continue. While the food, advertising and broadcasting industries may be breathing a sigh of a relief, their work is far from done.  Because when it comes to Washington, and when a company’s bottom line is at stake, companies are wise to stay vigilant – and heed the lessons of these recent events.

First, when concerns about an industry are being raised, companies need to act, not wait to react. In July 2011, a food industry coalition – the Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative – made a move and proposed its own voluntary guidelines for advertising some foods for children. The industry proposal was praised by some members of the interagency working group and is helping to shape the modifications to the original proposal.

Second, companies should seek opportunities to build relationships to foster goodwill before they find themselves in the hot seat. Companies can engage with decision-makers back home, on the Hill and in the White House who have a vested interest in the relevant policy issue. In the food industry, for example, initiatives like First Lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign against childhood obesity offer opportunities for engagement and collaboration.

Third, companies must tell the positive stories of corporate citizenship that so many are already voluntarily exercising. For instance, one major food company – and Podesta Group client – launched its “Meal a Minute” program, donating 10,000 meals in one week. Other companies are forming partnerships with charitable organizations and local schools, while some are voluntarily lowering sodium and sugar content in their foods. These companies have enlisted and will continue to need inventive government and public relations strategists to make sure others know about these noble works. Both to your own representatives and the specialized and general media who cover them, when your company has done good deeds or has good ideas, share them.

Whether it’s the food industry or an entirely different business, any company could one day find itself in the political and policy crosshairs. And when they do, it takes seasoned experts capable of executing shrewd strategies to ensure those companies have a seat at the table and are armed and ready to tell an accurate and compelling story to the decision-makers who matter.