Does label information reflect product properties? A Swiss case study of plant-based milk alternatives

• We identified a total of 327 labels on 66 milk alternatives. • Sustainability labels are underrepresented on milk alternatives. • ‘High protein’ and ‘Low fat’ labels reflect the nutritional value of the products. • The ‘no added sugar’ label might be misleading. • The ‘Nutri-Score’ label is less common among products of poorer nutritional quality. Front-of-pack labels are recognised as an important tool in guiding consumers towards healthier product choices. However, an overwhelming variety of labels can also lead to misleading label information. This is particularly the case for newer product categories, such as plant-based milk alternatives, where strict marketing regulations are lacking. To improve the consumer friendliness of front-of-pack labels, more in-depth label information is needed. The first aim of this study was therefore to investigate the number and types of front-of-pack labels for plant-based milk alternatives in the Swiss market. Second, we aimed to better understand whether label information reflects product properties. Therefore, we investigated the congruence between the label information of a product and its nutritional, compositional, and price properties. To this end, we conducted a comprehensive online market inventory to collect information from product packaging. For all products, the Nutri-Score for plant-based milk alternatives was calculated using the Rayner-Score method. Principal component analysis was used to analyse correlations between label information and product properties (i.e. nutrition, composition, price). A total of 327 labels were identified among the 66 plant-based milk alternatives, reflecting a high degree of heterogeneity. Nutrition labels (34 %) (i.e. ’kcal per 100 ml’, ‘no added sugar’, or ‘Nutri-Score’) and diet labels (29 %) (i.e. ‘vegan’ or ‘plant-based’) were used more often than sustainability labels (11 %) (i.e. ‘organic’, ‘climate footprint’, or ‘fairtrade’). Moreover, we found that products with ‘Nutri-Score’ or ‘climate footprint’ labels were more expensive. We conclude that ‘high protein’, ‘low fat’, and ‘low price’ labels reflect the nutritional value or price of the product. However, the ‘no added sugar’ label could potentially mislead consumers, as products with this label had a similar sugar content to products without this label. We also found that the lower the nutritional quality of a product, the less often the Nutri-Score was illustrated on the products. This study identified strategies that could improve the consumer friendliness of labels for plant-based milk alternatives. This might contribute to stricter labelling policies and more effective labelling in the future.