Once upon a time, in my lunchbox and in the lunchboxes of the other kids at my lunch table, there was just one kind of Oreo. You know. An Oreo (the lucky kids had Double Stuff). I was 10, and it was the last time in my life I could eat whatever I wanted and not be food obsessed. Today, I help people live thin, thrive in a world of food, and fit into their favorite pants.

Clients tell me all the time, “I don’t know why I bought that”! and “I can’t believe I ate that”! When I talk to people about their weight loss goals, it is obvious that no one wants to overeat. But it’s just too difficult for most people to defend themselves against the ubiquitous food cues that makes us eat too much. The foods we love to hate come in vivid, brightly colored and attractive packaging that immediately draws us to them when we’re trawling the aisles. They arouse our imagination before they stimulate our appetite. Slickly marketed, they encourage us to buy, consume and ultimately overeat them. We think that our choices are thoughtful and deliberate, and that we know what we’re doing. We think that what we eat is under our control, but much of it isn’t. Much of what we do is automatic and done without much thought.

IN THE SUPERMARKET: It Starts In The Cart

The supermarket industry has all kinds of techniques to make us feel like we have to buy something right now or we’ll lose out on an opportunity. They may say that it’s a time limited flavor or special (think of the cute little Girl Scouts selling Thin Mints this time of year and only this time of year… how many boxes did you buy?). Or, stores suggest the quantity to buy by offering three items for the price of two, or 10 items for $10. Those techniques encourage us to buy more, and when we buy more, we eat more.

Decision Making Fatigue
Psychology shows that we make lazier and poorer food decisions as the day goes on. It’s called decision making fatigue, The more decisions we have to make as we food shop, the more our ability to think carefully, calculate and make smart food choices is worn down. That’s when we reach for our bad boyfriend foods like Cheetos or Pop Tarts even though we know it will lead to trouble (you know, when you tell yourself it’s “for the kids”). At first, we may spend a long time figuring out what to buy and only putting “good guy” foods in our carts. But after making tons of food decisions, our brains get overloaded, and we pick foods based on appearance, convenience or want. Stores like CVS and supermarkets take advantage of that decision-making fatigue by selling candy and bakery goods at the cash register.

End Of Aisle Real Estate
People pay more attention to food at the end of the aisles. When the industry discovered that, end of aisle real estate became more valuable. The food at the end of the aisle may or may not be on sale. It’s only there because manufacturers know that location increases sales.

Why Are Their Ten Kinds Of Oreos?
Variety makes us eat more. In a well-known study, researchers gave one group of people a single type of pasta and another group three different shapes of pasta. The group with more variety ate more (almost 500 calories more!), even though all the pasta tasted the same. So, it doesn’t even need to be true variety. Just the appearance of variety makes us eat more. Thus, there are five kinds of Oreos on the shelves these days. And that’s because just changing the names of flavors or shapes of things makes us think they’re different. And that attracts us to buy. If you want variety, get it from different vegetables, fruits or protein sources. Five kinds of Oreos doesn’t give us true variety. It just gives us fat thighs.