Panera Bread (Or How to Pluck an EZ Chicken).

Panera Bread Company certainly got an earful this week! A dairy farmer/blogger – Dairy Carrie – wrote this post lambasting the company for its ridiculously misleading advertising campaign that essentially called livestock and poultry farmers who use antibiotics “lazy.”

Misleading. And offensive to farmers everywhere.

I know many farmers and I can say for certain that none of them are lazy. In fact, I would say farmers who raise turkeys, chickens, beef cattle, dairy cows, hogs and other livestock are the least lazy folks on the planet. Raising animals on a farm is a 24-7 job and I am continually amazed at how hard farmers work to make sure their animals are cared for properly.

Beyond the “lazy” comment, of course, is the marketing ploy that because Panera uses chicken.  turkey and ham that is “antibiotic-free”, it somehow equates to eating better chicken and turkey. Panera actually created a character called “EZ Chicken” that lazes around in a hammock and as Dairy Carrie put it in her blog post, “seems to be guilty of sloth.” The truth is, antibiotics on the farm are used to treat a sick animal (is this lazy?) and there are strict rules and guidelines to adhere to make sure there are NO antibiotic residues left within the birds prior to going to a processing plant. None.

Feedstuffs, a weekly publication that covers agribusiness, reminded folks on Facebook yesterday that the large chicken companies in the U.S. pledged several years ago to not use “nontherapeutic antibiotics”. (Nontherapeutic antibiotic use is typically defined as any use of an antibiotic for an animal in the absence of a clinical sign of disease.) And with strict residue testing in place, Feedstuffs indicated: “antibiotics in chicken that is served in restaurants or sold in the supermarket is a non-issue.”

Tell that to restaurant chains like Panera Bread and Chipotle.

In any case, besides Dairy Carrie’s post, many of my social media blogging friends (who are also farmers) have weighed in on this issue. Here are links to their posts:

• Standing Up to Panera Bread – Farmers are Not Lazy! By Minnesota Farm Living
• Are Farmers Lazy by SlowMoney Farm
• Why I’m Furious with Panera Bread by On the Banks of Squaw Creek
• Your Thoughts on Panera and Antibiotics by Crystal Cattle
• EZ Chicken and Affluent Narcissism by Cow Spots and Tales

Mom at the Meat Counter also has a great blog about antibiotic residue vs. antibiotic resistance: Antibiotics in the Meat Supply.

I am sure this won’t be the last time I get up in arms about misleading marketing tactics. I don’t like Perdue’s current line of advertising (“We Believe in a Better Chicken”) either, which touts that their chickens do not receive any added hormones or steroids. If you’ve read my blog before, you know exactly what I think about the no hormones/no steroids claim. If you don’t, read about this myth here and here.

Instead of perpetuating these myths with misleading marketing tactics, I would rather see us help consumers make choices based on solid, factual information.  In the meantime, kudos to Dairy Carrie for getting enough of us to speak up so that Panera Bread started to remove some references to its “EZ Chicken” on their Facebook page and delete its EZChicken Twitter account. It’s a start.

Want to follow and take part in the continued “fun”?  Watch for this hashtag on Facebook and Twitter: #PluckEZChicken.