Nutritional info on food labels and servings/portions?

[dowie]

Say you bought a smoothie as part of a meal deal - a small 360ml bottle along with a main (sandwich or salad) + snack (pack of crisps or some olives etc..).

Would you think it is odd for someone to describe that smoothie, clearly sold for an individual to have at lunch, as 2-3 portions? Portions based on what?

Likewise, suppose your pack of crisps was a 50g pack, again part of a meal deal - do you find it odd for that to be described as "2 servings"?

These were bought as part of meal deals at Tesco today (the smoothie) and M&S/WH Smiths yesterday (the crisps)

The smoothie (Mango smoothie by Naked) lists nutritional information per 100ml and per 150ml (why 150?) but is a 360ml bottle!

The Crisps (beef hula hoops) list some nutritional information on the front of the pack per 25g and on the back per 25g (why 25?) and per 100g... but it's a 50g pack!

I can understand the per 100ml and 100g etc.. is useful for comparison between products, but for products aimed at individuals, this "portion" or "serving" stuff is just total nonsense though and seems to be an attempt to deceive. It's not a ready meal for two we're talking about here.

 

[dowie]

Maybe it's so that they can't be accused of making people fat or giving them too much sugar.

I'd assumed it is more just to allow them to print lower figures on the packaging though I guess that is also possibly part of it

Smoothie is below for example, presumably, a portion is 150ml as they say it contains 2-3.... are they trying to pretend that they intend for someone to drink 150ml of it for breakfast? 150ml for lunch then has 60ml for tea?

Here are the Hula Hoops, a serving is 25g - so I guess they want to claim that they intend someone to buys a pack of crisps at lunch but then only eat half a pack, roll it up and have the other "serving" later? Or maybe share half the pack with someone else?

 

[dowie]

Might have cared about it at one point but as long as they offer enough information to work out the calories then meh?

It's mildly deceptive but you need to accept incompetence for partially reading or partially comprehending the data given since it's not lying or hiding the facts.

That doesn't bother me too much, it's still not difficult to work out how many calories are in your bag of crisps.

But the issue isn't necessarily with you guys - this is like the blindspot libertarians have, they might have some nice ideas if society had a 120 mean IQ but.... I'd assume the average poster on a tech forum is reasonably numerate, lots of other people aren't and there have been efforts made to make food labelling clearer, it's also quite easy for people not paying much attention to simply miss the details and assume that the info given is per pack or bottle etc..

We've had hospitals hammered recently and a big issue with Covid has been overweight and obese people, we'd have far fewer Covid issues (and problems for the NHS in general) if adults in the UK weren't so fat yet the majority are overweight and obese so I think this sort of thing is a bit dodgy.

They also seem to be going hard on promoting junk food in Tesco right now in conjunction with getting people to sign up for club cards in order to take advantage of their big discounts on bundles of crisps, sweets etc...

I think the food industry has basically just played around with the serving size, in order for it to fit the traffic light food labels (Calories, fat, saturates, sugars, salt) that they brought in a few years ago.

So they can give themselves the nice traffic light ratings on the front as no one realises that only applies as long as you only have one mouthful

I don't think that's it guys - the traffic lights work on a % basis no? So playing around with the portion sizes doesn't change the fact something might be say 30% fat and marked red etc...

I think it's more just about the figures themselves - people eyeballing a certain number of calories. That link is interesting thanks @Screeeech looks like the per 100g or 100ml is a standard thing (as expected) I think they're abusing the ability to put per portion though - on a meal for two it makes sense, it's clearly marketed for two people and so nutritional info per portion is logical there - for the things mentioned, not so much.

 

[dowie]

The red Amber green colour system for fat sugar and salt is done per portion not per 100g.

I'm guessing there was some heavy lobbying in that decision, because it aloes what you see there green label saying 10% of your daily fat! On the back includes 3 portions so actually 30%

Actually yeah you're right to flag that up (ditto to the other two posters @Screeeech & @tom_e ), it's either it seems... it can be per 100g or per portion.... which is pointless as the "portion" seems to be entirely arbitrary.

Who gets to decide that a 360ml bottle of smoothie is 2-3 portions? It's such an obvious loophole to abuse - obviously they don't take the mickey by claiming a bottle is 20 portions but they still seem to have just made up something for the sake of marketing there.

 

[dowie]

it's the same with everything.

if you get some dry rice and cook what the packet says is a portion it's like a childs serving, cereal as well a lot of them one box is like 4-5 servings only in reality.
wheetabix are awesome though a totally full box! imagine that! a box of food thats actually completely full instead of 50-75% full amazing! I didn't think it could be done

Yeah, but at least those things are clearly intended for multiple servings...

You don't expect to eat an entire box of cereal for breakfast but you probably do expect to eat a bag of crisps or have a drink as a single serving.

I get that cereal boxes downplay too, no one really pours out 30g of cereal it's more like double that, but it is a bit more legit to have a suggested portion size on something that is expected to be used for several portions not just one.

I think the alternative is to get rid of the serving size altogether, and simply assume that a bag of crisps (like what @dowie linked) will be consumed in one sitting, by one person (because that's the reality) the fun part is that if you did that - the entire label would be red

Yeah, I think it needs to be ditched on small items - i.e. drinks below a certain quantity, snacks or main meals below a certain weight etc.. they should simply contain a per 100g or ml figure and a per pack/bottle figure.

Clearly it can be more objective in some cases - if a ready meal is explicitly marketed as a meal for two: say an 800g supermarket shepherds pie instead of a 400g one then obviously it is reasonable to talk about per portion on the packaging and for that portion to be exactly half the contents.

It's not reasonable at all for a single (small) bag of crisps to be claimed as two servings in the small print or a small drink to be 2-3 servings (again in the small print) etc.. defeats the point of the traffic light system which was clear labelling.

 

[dowie]

And that's the thing - if they did remove the serving size, and a bag of crisps was in actual fact deemed to be a single serving (because it clearly is), and the traffic light label was all red - I'd be fine with it.

Actually, I'm not sure the crisps would, at least not the hula hoops - the crisps would go amber, green, green, amber (fat, saturates, sugars, salt) if they used traffic lights.

The smoothie on the other hand would be green, green, red, green - basically no fat or slat but loads of sugar... in the case of the smoothie they definitely want to avoid that as they try to market them as being healthy when they've got more calories/sugar than typical soft drinks these days.

I’m appalled at Dowies choice of snack.

Hula hoops are rank.

What? No way, they're a classic crisp-like snack! Large beef hula hoops in a grab bag are great - usually, grab them or some Real Mccoys.

Always make sure to get a triple sandwich (if buying a sandwich) or one of the big pasta things to get your money's worth - they're like £2.75 alone. And the drink has to be a Naked smoothie or a protein shake or a Starbucks latte thingie as they're all circa £2.50 or £2.75 each too.

Tesco meal deal for £3 is decent value - or perhaps looking at it the other way, the individual items are a rip-off if bought alone.

Like who picks up a £2.75 sandwich and just buys that by itself when for 25p more you can get a drink + a bag of crisps.

"clearly"... To a point, sure, they aren't "hiding" the information as such, but it's certainly obfuscated, if you have two 50g packs of crisps in front of you, one saying 50cal and one saying 30cal, you shouldn't have to have to read the small print and get the calculator out to establish that the 30cal one is actually worse because the "serving size" on that one is 25g, whereas the 50cal "serving size" is the whole pack.

Exactly - it isn't clear at all, it's hidden in the small print, which seems to be intentional.

A meal for two, explicitly marketed as such on the packaging is clear, a "portion" or "serving" then detailing nutritional info for half the contents makes sense. A small smoothie on the other hand is just a total bluff for the manufacturer to claim "2-3" servings.