Advertising does not influence our food choices debate
Answers
Product Awareness: The first purpose of advertising is to educate the customer about a product. Good ads provide not just provides information on what a product does, but also about what the product stands for. Like Apple stands for quality & innovation, Pepsi stands for youthful joy etc.
Quicken decision making: You are in a strange country. You walk into a juice bar and they have unfamiliar drinks. You then need to read in detail whether they are alcoholic/non-alcoholic, contain too much sugar or too little, tasty or not... It takes way too much time. Instead, if there were two well advertised brands, you then pick quick. I am familiar with Mountaindew. Ok, let me have one of that.
Way to stand out of competition: Let's suppose you make a cola that is very healthy. Drinking that reduces the risk of Diabetics. How would you make your cola stand out from the competition where there are dozens of brands? Of course, advertising. You create the initial impression of an health brand and hope that people eventually pass information to their friends.
Of course, anything good also come with negative things.
Children and anyone with lower maturity are more impacted by the ads.
Strengthen monopolies. Big companies have big pockets and could outspend the little guy out of the market.
Promotes poor choices (fast foods, excessive beauty stuff, alcohol).