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Today, Explained

Suing big food

Today, Explained

Vox

Politics, Daily News, News

4.310.3K Ratings

🗓️ 11 August 2023

⏱️ 26 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Tostitos chips without real lime. Root beer made with fake vanilla. Instant mac and cheese that isn’t so instant. These products are among the hundreds targeted by lawyer Spencer Sheehan. We talked to him last year about why he wants Big Food to stop misrepresenting its products. This episode was produced by Victoria Chamberlin, edited by Matt Collette, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Paul Robert Mounsey with help from Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Noel King. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained Support Today, Explained by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

A New York man has some beef with Taco Bell.

0:03.1

He's finally lost suit against the fast food chain accusing it of false advertising.

0:08.0

New York man is suing Taco Bell for $5 million.

0:11.8

He claims the ads make it look like the menu items are more full of meat and veggies

0:17.5

than they actually are.

0:18.9

The bigger beefier triple double crunch wrap.

0:23.2

Now the same law firm filed a suit in Florida last year against Burger King alleging the

0:27.3

company's ads make the burgers look bigger than they really are.

0:31.8

Starting in 2020, we saw a spike in these types of lawsuits.

0:35.4

And late last year, we reached a man who filed many of them.

0:39.1

They call him the vanilla vigilante.

0:41.7

Yeah, I would say I'm wired a little bit different.

0:44.7

Coming up on today's plane, we will ask this man Spencer Sheen, what motivates his possibly

0:49.7

absurd quest and we dig into what consumers, you, me, New York man, actually get out of

0:55.1

it.

0:56.1

This episode is brought to you by Seven Up Zero Sugar.

1:04.2

Picture this.

1:05.2

You're looking at the camera rolling your phone.

1:07.2

You see an old picture of you in your mates grinning hard into the camera and you sit

1:10.7

around a dinner table.

1:12.1

The food and vibes were perfect.

1:14.7

Infuse your joyful moments with Seven Up.

...

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