The Asterisk is Your Friend

Years ago, in a meeting between representatives from the legal, sales and marketing departments, someone suggested, "Really, we can pretty much say anything we want if we put an asterisk next to it, and then explain the overstatement or blatant lie on the back or the bottom in very small print."

In this case, that fine print would read: You can't really COUNT the peanuts and measure that count against the number of all the other nuts combined. When we say, "Less than 50%," we mean by weight. So, if you want, you can weigh all the peanuts and compare that result against the weight of all the other nuts combined and you'll find that it probably comes in at around 49.99999%. But don't you think it's cool how we managed to hide all the peanuts under a layer of the better nuts carefully placed on the top of the can? Do you know how long it took us to accomplish that feat of packaging? It's like automated food styling!"