“Sandwich Label Information Greatly Misleading” Says Which?

Healthier choices are not always obvious because several retailers are still failing to provide traffic light labelling on front of pack. Portion sizes and nutritional content vary greatly - you could be eating over three times the fat and saturated fat and double the amount of salt, depending on which brand you choose of the same type of sandwich.

18 May 2012 --- Which? research comparing three popular types of sandwich has highlighted inconsistent labelling across retailers which makes it difficult to easily identify healthier and less healthy choices. Clearer front of pack labelling including traffic lights is needed across the board so that it is easy to compare fat and salt levels.

Which? research looking at chicken salad, egg mayonnaise, and bacon, lettuce and tomato (BLT) sandwiches from the main retailers and coffee chains reveals that:

·        Healthier choices are not always obvious because several retailers are still failing to provide traffic light labelling on front of pack.

·        Portion sizes and nutritional content vary greatly - you could be eating over three times the fat and saturated fat and double the amount of salt, depending on which brand you choose of the same type of sandwich.

·        The wide variation in nutritional content shows that there is scope for some manufacturers to offer healthier products by reducing the fat, saturated fat and salt content of their products.

Which? wants:

·        Traffic light labelling displayed prominently on products by all retailers.

·        Further action taken to reduce fat, saturated fat, calorie and salt levels in sandwiches, including compliance with 2012 salt reduction targets.

A healthy choice?

To coincide with National Sandwich Week, Which? looked at the calorie, fat, saturated fat and salt content of three of the most popular types of sandwiches from the leading retailers and coffee shop chains. We based our analysis on the nutrition information provided by the manufacturers and compared the sandwiches by applying the Food Standards Agency traffic light labelling criteria to see if levels were high, medium or low in fat, saturated fat or salt.

We also compared the nutritional content per portion against guideline daily amounts (GDAs).

Overall findings

Several of the retailers (Asda, Boots, The Co-operative, Marks and Spencer, Sainsbury’s and Waitrose) provide traffic light labelling on their products to easily indicate fat, saturated fat, sugar and salt levels, but the rest do not.

Different portion sizes and nutritional content mean that you can eat three times the amount of fat and saturated fat depending on which sandwich you buy. Morrisons chicken salad sandwich, for example, contains 11.7g fat, whereas Costa’s contains 3.9g fat; Caffè Nero’s BLT sandwich contains 12.6g saturated fat, but one from Waitrose contains 3.2g.

There is up to twice as much salt in some sandwiches than others. A Lidl BLT sandwich has 3.36g salt in it but one from Boots has 1.5g; Marks and Spencer’s Roast Chicken and Salad Sandwich has 1.95g salt compared to Caffè Nero’s 1g.

The chicken salad sandwiches and egg mayonnaise sandwiches (with the exception of Gregg’s egg sandwich) were meeting 2010 salt reduction targets, but BLT sandwiches from Caffè Nero, Costa, Lidl and Tesco were still higher than the target. Some brands were already compliant with the stricter salt reduction targets set for the end of 2012 for sandwiches, although not for all three types of sandwich.

The sandwich with the lowest calorie content (Kcal) of those we looked at was a Caffè Nero chicken salad sandwich (272 Kcal); the one with the highest calorie content was a Gregg’s classic BLT with 550 Kcal.

Making choices easy

A Which? survey in February1 found that reducing the fat, sugar and salt levels in foods and consistent labelling are two of the top issues that people think the Government should be tackling in order to make it easier to eat healthily.

The main mechanism to encourage action by the food industry to help tackle obesity and diet-related disease is a Responsibility Deal’. This covers England only, but food companies that operate across the UK are involved. It encourages companies to sign up to voluntary pledges to take action. So far the pledges have been limited in scope, but they do include salt and calorie reduction in foods. Salt reduction targets have been set for a wide range of foods including sandwiches for 2012, building on previous work around 2010 salt reduction targets. No targets have, however, yet been set for beyond 2012 and not all companies have signed up. Of those we looked at Boots, Caffè Nero, Greggs, Lidl and Starbucks have not officially pledged.