The Breakfast Club - DONKEY: Kellogg's CEO Says Poor Families Should Eat Cereal For Dinner

Episode Date: March 1, 2024

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Hey guys, I'm Kate Max. You might know me from my popular online series, The Running Interview Show, where I run with celebrities, athletes, entrepreneurs, and more. After those runs, the conversations keep going. That's what my podcast, Post Run High, is all about. It's a chance to sit down with my guests and dive even deeper into their stories, their journeys, and the thoughts that arise once we've hit the pavement together. Listen to Post Run High on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Is it a reason? He gave me donkey of the day and I deserve it. People need to know.

Well, you need to tell them. I am. You have the voice. Tell them. It's time for donkey of the day. It's a reason, but you're so good at it. You're trying to be a fake ass Charlemagne. You know he wants Charlemagne to go.

Damn, Charlemagne. Who you give the donkey of the day to now? Well, donkey of the day for Friday, March 1st goes to Gary Pillnick, okay? Gary is the CEO of Kellogg's. Yes, Kellogg's, the home of your favorite cereals, okay? Everything from Froot Loops to Frosted Flakes, Corn Pops to Apple Jacks. Gary is the man with the plan behind all of that, okay? Some of y'all listening to me right now, and you just poured some 2% over a bowl of Rice Krispies for the kids.

Okay, they should be drinking almond milk, but I digress. Now, I've told y'all a million times that america does not know how to solve problems and one of the biggest problems if you ask me the biggest problem they don't know how to solve is poverty okay people with money i don't care if you're a billionaire millionaire even a thousandaire folks do not understand what is happening with the poor in this country especially if you've never been poor okay the wealthy the rich the middle class they have no understand what is happening with the poor in this country, especially if you've never been poor. OK, the wealthy, the rich, the middle class, they have no idea what is happening with the poor in this country. And this latest statement from Gary Pilnick, the CEO of Kellogg's, proves it.

He appeared on CNBC's Squawk on the Street, and he said that poor families should eat cereal for dinner. Listen, the cereal category has always been quite affordable, and it tends to be a great destination when consumers are under pressure. So some of the things that we're doing is first messaging. We've got to reach the consumer where they are. So we're advertising about cereal for dinner. If you think about the cost of cereal for a family versus what they might otherwise do, that's going to be much more affordable. The other places that we like to go is we talk about making sure we have the right pack at the right price in the right place. So having a different size pack that will have a different price point, that will take some pressure off the consumer while they're shopping.

So those are some of the things that we're doing. But in general, the cereal category is a place that a lot of folks might come to because the price of a bowl of cereal with milk and with fruit is less than a dollar. So you can imagine why a consumer under pressure might find that to be a good place to go. Right. I'm all for innovation and marketing, but the idea of having cereal for dinner, is there the potential for that to land the wrong way? We don't think so. In fact, it's landing really well right now, Carl. When we look at all of our data, of course, we would know that breakfast cereal is the number one choice for in-home consumption. We understand that for breakfast.

It turns out that over 25 percent of our consumption is outside the breakfast occasion. A lot of it's at dinner. And that occasion continues to grow as well as the snacking occasion. But cereal for dinner is something that is probably more on trend now and we would expect to continue as that consumer is under pressure hey yo gary pilnick i need you to shut the f up forever okay shut your rich privileged disconnected ass up forever first of all two things are wrong with this statement and gary you would notice if you decided to actually have conversations with the people you're talking about. Poor people been eating cereal for dinner.

Okay. We've been eating breakfast for dinner and not because we wanted to. All right. And how about this? The cereal some of us had to eat for dinner wasn't even Kellogg's. You know why? Because we couldn't afford it. Great value everything.

All right. Store brand everything. We couldn't afford Rice Krispies, so we had the toasted rice. All right. We didn't have Kellogg's Frosted Flakes. We had Great Value Frosted Flakes. There's a difference between Kellogg's Frosted Flakes, because they had Tony the Tiger. Great Value Frosted Flakes had a polar bear who didn't even have a name, as far as I knew. He might not have even been a real polar bear because he had

ski goggles on, gloves, and a scarf. Having to wear that defeats the whole purpose of being a polar bear, so he might not have even really been one kellogg's raising brand they had the sun on the box great value raising brand does not you know why because the sun don't shine on the poor in this country the nerve of gary pilnick to tell poor people to eat cereal for dinner this is why i say america doesn't know how to solve problems this is the ceo of a fortune 500 company and the only thing he can come up with in regard to the people being hungry in this country, is they should consider eating cereal for dinner. And guess what, Gary? Sadly,

you know, we're already doing that. Okay? If folks have to eat cereal for dinner, they're probably going to still be eating great value. Not Kellogg's, because Kellogg's is still too expensive. I grew up in 1978, single wide trailer, dirt road, mouse corner, South Carolina, and Kellogg's because Kellogg's is still too expensive. I grew up in 1978, single wide trailer, dirt road, Moscow in South Carolina and Kellogg's anything was a luxury. Okay.

It was a luxury then. And guess what? Prices have risen the 28% over the last four years. People can't even afford to eat what you suggested to eat. At least not your brand. Okay. Listen to me, Greg. Kellogg's latest financial reports. And you know this because you're the CEO of the company. The company's current revenue is over 15 billion dollars. They made that in 2022.

And that was an increase over 2021 when they made over 14 billion. Moral of the story is they made crazy paper. How about take some of that money and use it to help the poverty problem in this country? Y'all make more than enough money to be a part of some type of real solution and you should because overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity it is an act of justice it is the protection of a fundamental human right the right to dignity and a decent life you know who said that nelson mother freaking mandela y'all got all the money all the resources and you telling me the best idea you got is for folks to eat cereal for dinner? I got a question for Gary and other rich people in positions of power who have the ability to at least attempt to solve some of America's problems.

How long y'all going to keep playing in poor people's faces? How long before poor people get fed up and come to snatch your plate? You're making millions. You run a company making billions. And you tell poor people they need to eat cereal for dinner, even though poor people are way ahead of you and been doing that. How long are you going to play with people's problems and not come up with solutions? Because I'm telling you, America, we are right where a great black philosopher by the name of Tupac Amaru Shakur told us we would be in this greedy ass capitalist society. Let's listen. by the name of Tupac Amaru Shakur told us we would be in this greedy-ass capitalist society.

Let's listen. If I know that in this hotel room they have food every day, and I'm knocked on the door every day to eat, and they open the door, let me see the party, let me see them throwing salami all over the place, I mean, just like throwing food around, but they're telling me there's no food in here. You know what I'm saying?

Every day, I'm standing outside trying to sing my way in. You know what I'm saying? We are hungry, please let us in. We are hungry, please let us in. After about a week, that song was going to change to, we hungry, we need some food. After two, three weeks, it's like, you know, get me all the food, I'm breaking down the door. After a year, you know what I'm saying? I'm picking the lock, coming through the door you just like You know what I'm saying I'm picking the lock Coming through the door Blasting You know what I'm saying It's like you hungry You reached your level

You don't want anymore We asked ten years ago We was asking with the Panthers We was asking with them You know With the Civil Rights Movement We was asking You know

Now those people That were asking They're all dead and in jail So now what do you think We're going to do Ask Please give Gary Pelnick The CEO of kellogg's the biggest hee haw don't tell me you can't do nothing okay i got a partnership with the food bank in harlem you can

go to foodbanknyc.org right now to make a donation they give away a,000 meals a month right there in Harlem. Okay. And, and, and groceries to people. $1 provides 10 meals. Okay. So if I'm in partnership with them, imagine what Kellogg's could do. That's all I'm saying.

That's crazy. You hungry? Absolutely. I'm not going to damn cereal. Okay. Okay. That's cause we got food out there. All right.

With the, uh, willing daughters catering, you know, for providing food. You know, got everybody in here getting their back big. Yes, we got, speaking of back big or back small, whatever, I'm going to eat. And we got jerk wings. It's jerk, what is it? Jerk chicken wings, macaroni and cheese.

They got two kinds of macaroni and cheese. Who are you talking to? I don't know who she's talking to right now go through the airwaves make everybody hungry shrimp, salmon alright alright we just talked about people not being able to afford food why would you do that?

mostly when I'm listening to the radio they trying to get their name in the mail what are you talking about? let me ask you a question right he was talking about broke meals right when people can't afford it what meals do people use? And he was saying that cereal should be... Why did Lord have a restaurant? You see what I'm saying?

Why is Big Mac coming in? Why? Why? Why? Why? God damn, that chair became a low rider. Listen, what was the reason? Hey, just to let y'all know, they got tater tots, too, and then they got two different

types of mac and cheese. What are you talking about? I heard Jess talking about it, so... Damn, the dog lives matter. We don't need the rest of the menu. I had to come in here and heard Jess talking about it. Damn, the fad lies matter. We don't need the rest of the menu. I had to come in here and just come up. We don't need the rest of the menu. We're opening up the phone line. 800-585-1051.

We're asking. We're talking about meals that people can use. It's inflation. We're calling it the broke meals. The broke meals that people usually use. Salute to Colleen Witt. She has a great podcast called Eating While Broke. I was going to say, isn't that a podcast? Yes, it's on the Black Effect iHeartRadio podcast network.

So let's open up the phone lines and let's discuss. I don't like broke meals. I don't like the way that sounds. Y'all got to stop. Affordable meals. Affordable meals. Yeah, thank you, because broke meals is crazy. Don't keep doing that.

800-585-1051. I know as a kid, my cousin, when we used to go to Grandma's house in Starry City in Brooklyn, he used to eat ketchup sandwiches. That was his thing. He liked ketchup sandwich. It wasn't expensive. You could just put a little, my cousin, when we used to go to Grandma's house in Starry City in Brooklyn, he used to eat ketchup sandwiches. That was his thing. He liked ketchup sandwich. It wasn't expensive. You could just put a little ketchup, bread, go. Peanut butter and jelly.

Oodles of noodles. Yeah. That's a great meal. To this day. We doing that now. To this day. There's a woman in this room right now who came over to my house, and there was amazing food on the table. And she was like, no, I want oodles of noodles.

This is nasty. I'm not going to say her name, I want oodles of noodles because this is nasty. I'm not going to say her name. I'm just going to say she's from Baltimore. Oodles of noodles. That's what I wanted. If you spread out the peanut butter and jelly, just do jelly sandwiches then you can save the peanut butter for the next week. So now that's two weeks.

Go run around the station or something. Go run around the station. You get a peanut butter sandwich and then the next week you got a jelly sandwich. 800-585-1051 let's talk about uh affordable meals sometimes you got to put things together ain't much in your cabinet and you put things together to make sure you satisfy your stomach now big mac and you got to do a lot to satisfy your stomach but that's what we're talking about 800-585-1051 what are those meals let's discuss at the breakfast club good morning donkey of the Day is sponsored by renowned

personal injury attorney Michael the Bull Lammisoff. Don't be a donkey when you need a fighter on your side. If you're ever injured, go to MichaelTheBull.com. That's MichaelTheBull.com. And when you mess with the bull, you get the horns. Wake that ass up. In the morning. The Breakfast Club. Hey guys, I'm Kate Max.

You might know me from my popular online series, The Running Interview Show, where I run with celebrities, athletes, entrepreneurs and more. After those runs, the conversations keep going. That's what my podcast, Post High is all about. It's a chance to sit down with my guests and dive even deeper into their stories, their journeys, and the thoughts that arise once we've hit the pavement together. Listen to Post Run High on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.