NEW YORK, JUNE 18 2019: Americans are at risk of serious illnesses, as new research today revealed that 72% of consumers do not understand the recommended levels of salt, fat and sugar consumption. The statewide health survey by Spoon Guru, a world leader in AI technology designed to transform food discovery, revealed just 28% of shoppers think they can confidently decipher the value of nutrients in food, with an opportunity for retailers to offer new tools to give better transparency.
The study¹, which looked into consumer spending habits and motivations for purchasing decisions, highlighted that 54% of US shoppers want retailers to do more to encourage healthy eating. The survey found a quarter of Americans believe retailers should offer tools in order to identify the right foods to improve health and dietary requirements.
This is following 40% of Americans revealing they are afraid of developing a serious illness and 19% fear an early death due to an unhealthy diet. As a result, 74% of those surveyed stated they have tried to improve their health and wellbeing over the past year - however the new study suggests they are failing with a staggering 88% revealing their diet is still unhealthy. In line with these findings, 68% of respondents revealed they eat five or more processed meals a week, despite half of Americans (50%) claiming they have been eating less processed food over the past year. The conflicting results suggest shoppers may be attempting to eat healthier but are unaware processed foods include cereals, pasta, cheese, etc.
Further to this, those who stated they were eating less sugar (55%), the research found that almost a third of US consumers (29%) are using honey as an alternative, and 10% are using maple syrup, suggesting consumers are lacking the knowledge that these products contain a high level of sugar. Additionally, 2 in 5 (42%) respondents admitted they add two or more spoonfuls of sugar to their daily hot drinks. Meanwhile, 32% of Americans are also only eating one piece of fruit a day, and 23% one vegetable.
In a bid to prevent health related diseases by improving their diet, 59% revealed the cost of their weekly grocery shop had increased; with most claiming to spend as much as $31 more each week. the cost associated with eating healthy proved to be the biggest barrier for 48% of those surveyed, with 67% of respondents claiming they would purchase healthier food if retailers lowered costs.
To encourage healthy eating, US consumers want retailers to:
Lower costs on healthy options - 67%
More promotions of healthy products - 44%
Healthy snacks by the checkout - 35%
Better placement of healthy foods in-store - 32%
Suggestions on healthy food swaps - 26%
Tools needed to encourage US shoppers to make healthier food choices:
In-store food discovery taste tests - 46%
Healthy eating recipes in-store - 40%
Better food labels on packaging - 39%
Better food labels on shelves - 37%
Technology to aid food discovery - 25%
Markus Stripf, co-founder and CEO of Spoon Guru, commented: “Americans are trying to adopt a healthier diet, however there is a need for further clarity around nutrition. In particular, how they can manage their fat, salt and sugar intake to prevent health related illnesses. What is also clear from the research is that a quarter of consumers are open to exploring technology that can assist with the everyday challenge to find the right foods in order to eat healthier.
About Spoon Guru
Established in 2015, Spoon Guru is a London-based technology start-up that has developed a unique food search & discovery engine to cater for individuals with multiple or complex search requirements. A world leading end-to-end solution, Spoon Guru combines AI and machine learning with nutritional expertise to determine every product or any recipe‛s true suitability for each individual shopper.
Spoon Guru’s award winning proprietary TAGs® platform enables food businesses to deliver a highly personalised experience tailored to each consumer, based on their distinct and unique dietary needs – increasing the choice of foods available, whilst minimising the effort to find them. The platform analyses every ingredient as well as its nutritional value which allows the technology to allocate the appropriate dietary tags to each product, enabling large and unstructured data sets to be easily searched and accurately filtered to deliver relevant choices.
With sixty four percent of the world’s population now actively excluding foodstuffs from their diet, the food industry is under mounting pressure to meet a growing consumer demand for tailored food choices - Spoon Guru TAGS® relieves this pressure by allowing food businesses, such as Tesco, to do so with ease.
Spoon Guru received a number of accolades in 2018, including the Retail Week Awards Customer Innovation Award for its partnership with Tesco, the Retail Technology Gamechanger Award at the World Retail Awards, and Technology Supplier of the Year award at The Grocer Gold awards. The masterminds behind the technology – Markus Stripf, Tim Allen and Simon O’Regan – were also presented with the Retail & E-Commerce Tech Founder of the Year at the 2018 BMW i UK Tech Founder Awards.
In the US, Spoon Guru was chosen as a 2019 Red Herring Top 100 North America winner. The company was also presented the Personalized Nutrition Initiative accolade at the Nutraingredients awards, and awarded a Silver Stevie by the American Business Awards® in the category of Most Innovative Tech Company of the Year. Spoon Guru was awarded The IGD Digital Engagement Award in 2017, beating out large corporations Mars Chocolate and Coca Cola, and received highly commended for the App of the Year and Innovative Business of the Year awards at the Start-up Awards.
References
¹Survey results from May 2019 with 2,000 US respondents
