San Francisco has done something that will make brand managers, lawyers, and marketers equally uncomfortable — it has sued the food industry for doing its job too well.
In early December, the city filed a sweeping lawsuit against some of America’s biggest food manufacturers—names that dominate supermarket aisles and advertising budgets alike.
Coca-Cola. Nestlé. PepsiCo. Kraft Heinz. General Mills. Kellogg’s. Mondelez. Mars. ConAgra. Post Holdings.
The charge is blunt: ultraprocessed foods have fuelled a public health crisis, and the companies that engineered, marketed, and monetised them should now be held accountable.
For marketers, this is not a nutrition debate. It is a moment of reckoning.
From Desire Creation to Damage Control
Ultraprocessed foods are not an accident of modern living.
They are the result of decades of deliberate optimisation—taste engineering, shelf stability, cost efficiency, craveability.
Marketing didn’t invent these products, but it certainly perfected the desire for them.
San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu’s language is unusually direct for a legal filing: these companies, he argues, “took food and made it unrecognisable and harmful to the human body.”
The lawsuit links ultraprocessed foods to Type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease, heart disease, colorectal cancer, and even depression—conditions now appearing earlier in life.
What makes this different from previous food scares is not the science.
It is the legalframing. This is not about individual choice.
It is about unfair competition, public nuisance, and deceptive marketing.
In other words: how products were sold, normalised, and embedded into daily life—especially among children.
That places marketing squarely in the dock.
The End of “Just a Treat”
For decades, brands have relied on a familiar defence: moderation.
“Just a treat.” “Part of a balanced lifestyle.” “Enjoy responsibly.”
The problem is that when more than half of Americans’ daily calories now come from ultraprocessed foods, moderation is no longer a credible narrative—it is a convenient myth.
An August CDC report confirmed that ultraprocessed foods account for over 50% of caloric intake in the US.
California has already moved to phase certain ultraprocessed foods out of school meals over the next decade.
US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has publicly targeted these products as part of his “Make America Healthy Again” agenda, even pushing to exclude them from food assistance programmes.
When public policy, healthcare economics, and legal strategy align, marketing loses its ability to spin its way out.
What This Means for Brands—Beyond the US
Make no mistake: this lawsuit is not just an American story. It is a template.
Once the legal logic is tested, it will travel. Cities. States. Eventually, countries. Malaysia included.
Malaysia’s own obesity, diabetes, and non-communicable disease statistics already mirror worrying global trends.
The question is not if scrutiny will arrive, but when—and how prepared brands will be.
For food marketers, three uncomfortable truths now loom large:
Marketing’s Next Test of Integrity
The lawsuit seeks more than penalties.
It demands consumer education, restrictions on advertising to children, and an end to what it calls deceptive marketing.
That should make every CMO pause.
Because this is where marketing faces its hardest question yet: Is our job simply to sell what exists—or to take responsibility for what we help normalise?
The era of plausible deniability is ending.
Brands can no longer say, “We just meet consumer demand,” when that demand has been carefully engineered, reinforced, and sustained by decades of messaging.
The food industry has faced reform moments before—trans fats, sugar labelling, tobacco-style warnings in some markets.
Each time, marketing adapted. This time, adaptation will require more than new packaging or softer language. It will require a redefinition of value.
Not “tastes amazing.” Not “sells fast.”
But “can we stand by this, publicly, ten years from now?”
Because when cities start suing, the court of public opinion has already made up its mind.
Marketing, for once, will not be allowed to look away.
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