Nutrition marketing

Given the obesity epidemic, marketing of non-nutrient dense food has been debated as a policy issue. This research sought to determine how frequently nutrition marketing (health claims, nutrient content claims, or implied claims) is used on labels of foods containing high amounts (>20% daily value) of saturated fat, sodium, and/or sugar (operationally defined as >21grams sugar for fruit/milk based products and as >6 grams sugar for non-fruit/milk based products). All items with food labels (N=9,429) in one local grocery store were visually surveyed. Forty-five percent of products had nutrition marketing on the label. Sixty-eight percent of nutrition marketing was considered a nutrient content claim, 28% was considered an implied claim, and only 4% were FDA recognized health claims. Of those with nutrition marketing, 52% had high saturated fat, sodium and/or sugar content; high sugar content being the most frequently identified (12.57%, 22.18%, and 33.61%, respectively). The most commonly used nutrition marketing statements on products >20% saturated fat were “good source of calcium”, “natural”, “health professional recommended”, “low/trans fat free”, and “made with real…”. The most commonly used nutrition marketing statements on products >20% sodium were “reduced/low fat”, “health professional recommended”, “reduced/low calories” “no preservatives”, and “low/trans fat free”. The most commonly used nutrition marketing statements on products >20% sugar were “good source of calcium", “reduced/low ”, “natural” “good source of iron”, and “contains whole grains”. The influence of nutrition marketing of products (with high saturated fat, sodium and/or sugar content) on consumer product choice is still unknown.