Nearly doubling its number of restaurants since 2010, Chipotle has managed to stomp all over its competition.
The Mexican-style fast-casual chain has captured the stomachs and pocketbooks of the office worker. Which means fast-food joints like McDonald’s have to settle for strung-out buffoons stumbling out of strip clubs, for customers (at least that’s how it is here in Baltimore).
Well, the two businesses never did cater to the same customer in the first place, but I wanted to throw that line in there because a) I think McDonald’s is disgusting and b) I want to see how many people I can offend.
Anyway… in April, Chipotle pulled a brilliant marketing coup: Declare they won’t be serving any GMO food. That would be food made with genetically modified ingredients.
Now they’re being sued (in America? Shocking!)
Here’s why:
Their meat, cheese, and sour cream may be technically GMO-free. But all of these foods were made from animals fed GMO soy and corn. Plus, the soft drinks they serve are made with GMO corn syrup.
The latter point makes me roll my eyes. As if the restaurant chain is going to say in their marketing, “We’re going GMO-free… except for the garbage sugar-water products that have no chance of being healthy anyway.”
But the first part… is worth pontificating upon.
Because is a food truly GMO-free if the food was nourished with GMO ingredients? How far back up the supply chain should you go?
… And wait a minute. Does that mean… because I have eaten GMO foods in my lifetime… I am a GMO food, if someone were to eat me?! Freaky.
I’m also not the first person to bring up that point. Seriously. Chris Arnold, Chipotle’s communications director, actually did in his response about their meat coming from animals fed GMO grains: “That does not mean that our meat is GMO any more than people would be genetically modified if they ate GMO grains.”
Gives a whole new spin on The Twilight Zone episode “To Serve Man.” Would the aliens eat GMO people?
The Chipotle rep also said beverages aren’t “food.” Now that’s the answer when the lawyers start slobbering! Fight fire with fire, and bog them down in silly technicalities! Everyone wins! And by “everyone,” I mean the lawyers, with their billable hours. (Anyone want to send in some good lawyer jokes?)
It looks like Chipotle is going to stick to its guns and continue selling Coke beverages.
We here at Living Well, on the other hand, have taken a different approach when it comes to our nutritional supplements. Some companies may claim their product is GMO-free but that might not be the case. For instance, you can have a capsule containing some natural herbs that are all GMO-free. But the filler ingredients (like maltodextrin) could be made from GMO ingredients. As a result, the supplement is indeed GMO.
That’s why whenever we design a product, we made sure every part of it is GMO-free so the same can be said about the end result. We’ve done so with Enza-Soothe, our joint health product, as well as VitaOlive, our heart health product. Nature’s Sleep Solution too (and I’d link to it, but we’re sold out).
Here’s the scary part: It might get more difficult for us to do this in the future… if not impossible. That’s because the government wants to cover the whole GMO situation with enough red tape to smother every small business in sight. Click here to read how… and what YOU can do about it.
Regards,
Nate Rifkin
Underground Health Researcher
Nate’s note: I have zero direct evidence that the lawyers suing Chipotle are genetically modified. I’m just guessing they have drunk a few sodas in between rounds of eating human souls.
