Chude Uzoka-Anofienem, Staff Writer

Last month, three prominent YouTubers, MrBeast, Logan Paul and KSI launched “Lunchly”, a brand of lunch kits for kids to take to school. I guess it serves as a direct competitor to Lunchables. When I was a kid, Lunchables were the hottest thing on the market. Everybody was jealous of the kid who brought Lunchables to school with them. Everybody wanted them for their lunch. The only problem is that they were disgusting. Some processed cheese and circles of a meat product that you put between a couple crackers. Sometimes you might even get a mini chocolate bar or candy for “dessert.” Even the creator of Lunchables wouldn’t feed them to his children.

The three YouTubers were met with criticism for this, which was pretty much expected. YouTubers selling products to children? Thank goodness! For far too long, children have been deprived of the opportunity to incessantly beg their parents for the latest cheaply made plastic treasure advertised to them by someone their age, dressed as a superhero, screaming into a camera at 9 a.m. on a Tuesday.

Who needs public education when little Johnny can learn the value of consumerism at the tender age of five, all thanks to Ryan’s FunTime Explosion Awesome Squad? I mean, let’s face it: if your child doesn’t already have a bedroom full of branded figurines and merch from their favorite YouTuber, are they even being raised properly?All jokes aside, let’s actually talk about Lunchly.

The way these creators are pushing it, is that Lunchly is a “healthier” alternative to Lunchables. They have a section called “US vs. THEM” on their website where they compare the nutritional value. It’s junk vs. slightly better junk. The “-ier” in “healthier” must be doing a lot of heavy lifting, because in the end, it is just some crackers, cheese and heavily processed meat. Lunchly also contains a chocolate bar called Feastables and a hydration drink called Prime in each box. 

The whole idea seems more like a way to boost their sales. Logan Paul claimed that Lunchables had lead in it and was immediately reminded that Prime, which he owns, has at least three pending claims against it. The quality of this product is definitely up for debate considering that someone found mold in their kit a week after launch, suggesting it’s been sitting in a warehouse for quite some time.

If the product was marketed more as some kind of status symbol for many kids who watch these guys on YouTube, it would at least be more honest. I’m not against the general idea of marketing to kids. That may have something to do with the fact that I grew up in an era where TV shows were marketed to directly cater towards kids. Without it, shows like Transformers and G.I. Joe wouldn’t even exist.

The rules are different now, of course. The FCC recently issued $3 million in fines to TV stations that played Hot Wheels toy ads during a Hot Wheels cartoon, can’t do that anymore. You can make a Hot Wheels cartoon show and air ads for Hot Wheels toys or video games, but you can’t play them at the same time. 

Kids don’t do their own grocery shopping, so the question is will parents spend an extra dollar a lunch, $5 dollars a week, $200 a year, because their kid wants the YouTuber lunch? Must be a gamble, which brings me to the real reason why I don’t think these guys should do this: they aren’t very good at it. In response to the criticism, Logan Paul said “We spent our lives creating content and building our brands”, and he continued “Now we want to build businesses”.

So far, the businesses you built, Logan, are a crypto game that failed and duped a bunch of your fans that you talked into buying NFTs for a game that never got made and Prime is also tanking, with Paul backing out of a deal he made with the bottling company Refresco when he didn’t sell enough product. They are now suing him for breach of contract. Your brother started a school years ago. How’s that doing? 404 on the website, huh? Guess he’s free from worrying about those finances. 

MrBeast is still trying to scrape his name off of that awful burger company and they’re countersuing. He’s also facing a class action lawsuit from the contestants of an Amazon reality show he created, alleging unsafe working conditions and sexual harassment. It seems that the fame is fleeting and they’re trying to keep their little economy afloat by starting businesses that may outlast their YouTube careers.

Companies like Monster, McDonald’s, Hershey’s and of course, Lunchables, have established a legacy, as they’ve been around for a while, ranging from 22 years to over 100. That’s what these guys want. I know that’s what Logan wants. As he even used the birth of his child to promote it. All class, this guy. But maybe in 20 years that kid will grow up and one of his friends has a Lunchly box. He can say, “my dad made that,” and if the universe really has a sense of humor, that kid will say, “who’s your Dad?” “The guy who hired people convicted of crimes against children or the guy who filmed a dead body in Japan and ripped people off with NFTs?” It’s only then, that these legacies will truly be preserved better than the meat products you’re selling.