The market for consumer and pre-packaged food has steadily risen over the past decade. With this increased market, there has been a demand from the consumers for healthier food options with transparent ingredient information. The cultural movement in the food industry has made consumers much more aware of the ingredients that affect the welfare of their health and families.
Over the past 30 years, the amount of information that the federal government requires on the nutrition label has increased. The federal government mandates that the nutritional panels display the calorie count, serving sizes, and added sugars, to allow the consumer to make an educated decision. This allows the consumer to make informed decisions about the quality of the ingredients being consume.
Food manufacturers have been responding by reformulating and removing ingredients such as high fructose corn syrup, “artificial” products, GMOs, which have been labeled as unhealthy to the consumer. The manufacturers had the intentions of removing these defining words which give their product a bad name. Many of these reformulated products come at a great monetary cost to the manufacturers, with results that have not improved the actual nutritional values.
Many large companies who have made the switch to “clean labeling” have not received the desired response as they have expected. The consumer is still weary of long ingredient lists, and products that seem too good to be healthy. The food industry is making efforts to become more transparent with their customers to gain their trust back. As the consumer becomes more educated, manufacturers will have to respond to their requests.