BBC Two Scotland

Dominic Crossley-Holland

The Foods that Make Billions

Learning

05/05/2011

BBC Two - The Foods that Make Billions

Series exploring how big businesses transform commodities into profitable brands.

The untold story of how big business feeds us by transforming simple commodities into everyday necessities and highly profitable brands.

This major new BBC2 series tells the untold story of how big business feeds us by transforming simple commodities into everyday necessities and highly profitable brands. Including the extraordinary story of how the bottled water industry has grown from nothing to become one of the biggest success stories in the modern food and beverage industry in just forty years.

With unprecedented access to the world's largest food and beverage companies, including Nestle and Danone, this is the inside story of how the bottled water business has become emblematic of an age of plenty in the West. With billions at stake, the market is fiercely fought over by the world's multinationals who promise us health, convenience and youth. It is natural and pure and sourced at minimal cost, its real value lies in the marketing and branding. Told by the Money Programme team, this film takes us to Hawaii, Japan, North America, France, Switzerland and Scotland to chart what lies behind the incredible success of this industry and explore what it tells us about ourselves.

The incredible story of how business has turned grain into the biggest success story of the modern food industry. Inside the cereal box is the most sophisticated confection of invention, processing and advertising that modern business has seen.

With unprecedented access to the world's largest food companies, including Kelloggs, this is the inside story of how breakfast cereals have transformed the way we eat and the way we live. This is the original processed, convenience food and it has ushered in a modern age of plenty in terms of choice and abundance. Cereals are cheap and abundant but their real value lies in the processing, advertising and marketing that goes into creating well known brands. It's a controversial business that both responds to and drives our changing relationship with food and our obsession with health. The Money Programme team tells this extraordinary story of a business that has helped shape the modern world of business and advertising that we know today.

The story of how yoghurt has been transformed from an unknown hippy food into a super food in forty years. Along the way, yoghurt has driven a health revolution in the modern food business. 
With access to the world's largest food companies, including Danone, Nestle, Yakult and PepsiCo, this film from the Money Programme team travels to Japan, Finland, France to explain how yoghurt's most important role has been to lead the food industry into the lucrative new market of functional food. The film explains how and why, today, all major food companies consider themselves less as processed food companies and more as health and wellness providers. It's a story of how our changing attitudes to food and health have both shaped and been influenced by this extraordinary industry. The story of yoghurt tracks a changing and diversifying Britain, along the way delivering consumers enormous choice and business, enormous profits.

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