Food products have a lot of information to convey, but what is the most valuable for consumers? While brand presence and name are crucial, the Wall Street Journal's Dr. Carol Cassella recently said that the ingredients on food products are the single most important thing worth highlighting. Moreover, in her view they should be the only thing that these products display.
Writing for this source, Dr. Cassella says that whittling down whether or not a food product is right for a shopper shouldn't be as difficult as it often is. Using Michael Pollan's definition of eating "real foods," she says that too much emphasis is put on commonly hyped "buzz phrases" rather than the actual contents. If manufacturers focused on this, the process of looking for healthy foods would be easier because customers wouldn't have to hunt as much for the information they need.
Dr. Cassella also alleges that awareness efforts should help consumers learn more about the things that are in commonly available foods. Making ingredients simple to read and identify is the best tactic for companies, and an industrial printing solution they can maintain and use on their own helps them control their labels.
"Certainly trans fats are not good for you (they can increase your risk of heart disease and diabetes) and glutens are decidedly a problem for patients with celiac disease," Dr. Cassella writes. "But the hijacked hype of these labels by food companies to imply their often unhealthy food is healthy is misleading at best and a root cause of obesity and diabetes at worst."
As an alternative to dealing with crowded labels, businesses have to think about how troublesome overcrowded labels are for consumers, and how detrimental this could be to their bottom line. With more efficient label printers, this is an easier task.
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