My son just brought home a bottle of apple juice.
"100% Apple Juice From Concentrate" it said on the label. That sounds good to me. We're not big juice drinkers, but he's young and eats a well-balanced diet. Some fruit juice once in awhile won't hurt him.
Label reader that I am, I examined the attractive logo on the bottle. (You can't read the print, but you can see the design in this photograph.) It's green, yellow and orange – like a flower or the shining sun. Maybe the juice is natural, organic or enriched with vitamins?
The not-so-fine print on the logo says:
Source of Energy - מקור לאנרגיה
What's that supposed to mean?
Energy means calories when it comes to food. Unless it's water or a diet drink, it's going to have calories. And those calories are a source of energy. The nutrition label states clearly that one cup of this apple juice has 96 calories. Of course it has energy.
So the eye-catching logo is telling us the obvious – that apple juice is a source of energy. Big deal!
Much of food marketing is just like this – catchy (or not so catchy) phrases that don't mean much of anything. So it's up to you to bypass the hype and go straight to the helpful information – the nutrition label. From there, compare prices and choose the best deal.
Ah... one of my favorite messages. I write for a living. Read things carefully! One of the marketing ploys that really bugs me is the chocolate puddings aimed at mothers struggling with picky kids. Contains Iron and Calcium! That's nice, isn't it? But no one explains to these mothers that their child isn't going to absorb that iron! Yes - read labels carefully and think about what you are reading. And learn!
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