Do you feel like you’re being fooled every time you go to the grocery store now a days? As you walk down the isle passing organic canned food, organic plastic wrap pre-made meals, healthy food with “natural flavorings”, it can really make you start to wonder. 

It’s no secret that many companies in the food industry have money as a priority over the general public’s health. A lot of large and powerful brands like coca-Cola and Pepsi actually own a lot of companies that claim to be small and organic.  This makes it more and more difficult to navigate through grocery stores.

The word natural has lost all meaning, most food is genetically modified or is sprayed with pesticides. Food like corn and bananas have been so heavily modified, the idea of them being organic almost seems impossible now.

Many of these natural brands you find in the grocery store have their own section of expensive organic products. They are double, if not triple the price of all the other non-organic products, the problem is some of these food items are just as bad. Sure, compared to Lucky Charms, most of these are a better choice, but there are still many unnecessary chemicals in these products that are being sold to you for an extremely high price.

Some of these products include brands like:

Kashi

Unfortunately owned by Kellogg, the multi-billion dollar corporation responsible for Cornflakes and Rice Crispies. This company purposely paints a natural, family owned company picture on their merchandise. “Kellogg acquired the Kashi brand in 2000, but the Kashi website continues to paint a picture of being a small company: “We are a small (after 25 years, still fewer than 70 of us) band of passionate people.””

 Bear Naked 

Another supposedly small company that’s actually owned by Kellogg.

The problem with these companies is that they blatantly lie through carefully crafted marketing. All of these brands appear to be healthy and assume the buyers are lazy enough to not read the ingredients or really look into the food industry.

Bear Naked was originally founded, by entrepreneurs but was never actually labelled as organic. Kellogg still markets the brand as “100% natural” even though there is no official no policy against the use of toxic pesticides and genetically engineered ingredients.

“The Bear Naked website’s “about us” story is long and detailed, yet fails to mention the acquisition by Kellogg in 2007. In fact, the name “Kellogg” appears nowhere on Bear Naked packages or the Bear Naked website.”

 Mom’s Best

This friendly named company has the word mom in it, so you’d like it would have your best health in mind. In reality, mom stands for Malt-O-Meal, a company originally founded in 1919. Today, the company owns many different brands, none of which are certified organic, yet they still sell exclusively to Whole food markets.

“The Mom’s Best brand seems to hide that it is a Malt-O-Meal brand. The Mom’s Best website states: “Our company has been owned by the same family for four generations. Mom’s Best is named in honor of our mother who taught us the importance of good food, as well as stewardship.””

Nutritious Living 

This brand is owned by an incredibly misleading company named Organic Milling Corporation. They are not exclusively an organic based company, mostly manufactoring non-organic cerales and granola for other brands to buy. Tests were done on their Nutritious Living Hi-Lo cereal to find there was genetically engineered ingredients used.

Always read the labels of what you’re buying in the store. A great way to avoid all these unnecessary chemicals and actually save money in the long run, is to buy separate

ingredients and make your own. Buying in bulk at farmers markets can cost less over time.

The ultimate solution is growing your own food, but that’s not always possible for everyone. If you have even the smallest amount of land, planting pots or space to grow, you can start creating your own food!