MAPS

SF vs. UPF

Last week, the City of San Francisco filed a lawsuit against ten of the country’s largest food companies, claiming they “designed, manufactured, marketed, and sold…foods knowing they were dangerous for human consumption.” The lawsuit focuses on what are known as “ultraprocessed foods” (UPFs).

MAPS has produced analysis looking at the ten companies, with a view to establishing whether any of them are at more or less risk in this context from a reputational perspective – and why.

Attention Is Not Evenly Distributed

First, we looked at how each of them showed up in media coverage and social media coverage in the weeks before the announcement of the lawsuit, to establish a baseline share of voice. We then compared that to their share of UPF-related coverage and commentary over the last year.

When we compare the figures, it’s clear that some companies function as lightning rods for public attention around UPFs, while some remain more under the radar than might be expected. Those disconnects show us the underlying patterns in how issue-specific attention concentrates – and these patterns are also useful for communications leaders outside of the ten companies named in the lawsuit.

Here are the baseline numbers. These percentages show each company’s share of total media coverage and social commentary across the ten companies for a three-week period in November 2025.

Three companies dominate attention:

– Nestlé (25%)
– PepsiCo (19%)
– Coca-Cola (17%)

Two more form a second tier:

– Kellanova (13%)
– Kraft Heinz (11%)

The remaining five are relatively quiet, and together represent only 15%:

– General Mills (4%), Mars (4%), Post (3%), Mondelez (3%), ConAgra (2%)

Next we’ll look at how each company’s UPF-specific share of voice compares to its typical share – and explore which of the 10 companies are unexpectedly over- or under-exposed.

Disproportionate Scrutiny

Using the typical levels of media coverage and social commentary for the ten companies as a baseline, now we’re answering this question: are certain companies more exposed to reputational risk around UPFs than others?

MAPS created a UPF Exposure Index by comparing each company’s typical share of voice with their share of UPF-related coverage and commentary.

Two companies stand out as significantly over-exposed – and appear more often in UPF-related coverage and commentary than their baseline would predict:

– Coca-Cola (+9.1%)
– Kellanova (+8.9%)

Three others are moderately over-exposed:

– Mondelez (+4.1%)
– General Mills (+3.7%)
– ConAgra (+0.8%)

And several companies are under-exposed – some by a wide margin – and show up in UPF discussion much less often than their overall scale would suggest:

– PepsiCo (−10.5%)
– Nestlé (−9.8%)
– Mars (−3.0%)
– Kraft Heinz (−2.0%)
– Post (−1.3%)

Why is this? The analysis shows that some companies may become the public face of a controversy – despite facing the same legal risk – while others remain peripheral. This distinction is key to anticipating pressure and shaping communications strategy around any emerging issue.

What This Pattern Tells Us

What emerges from all this is not just a story about ingredients – or legal exposure – but one about how attention concentrates around emerging issues. The same issue can land very differently across companies that, on paper, face similar risk.

In UPF-related discussion, some brands appear to function as symbolic stand-ins for broader public anxieties around health, corporate power, and consumer trust. Brands with high cultural visibility, simplified product narratives (and portfolios), or a history of engagement and involvement in nutrition-related topics are more readily available as reference points, and as a result attract disproportionate attention. Other brands, conversely, benefit from a degree of narrative ‘insulation.’

Put another way, lawsuits and similar catalysts accelerate existing patterns of attention, rather than creating them from scratch. For communications leaders, the most relevant question is not just “are we exposed?” but “how likely are we to become the focal point if and when this issue breaks?”

Want to know how your company shows up? MAPS produces issue-specific Snapshots to help communications leaders understand whether their organization functions as a lightning rod on emerging issues – or whether attention concentrates elsewhere, and why.