Is it nuts to assume a scoop of pistachio ice cream should contain actual pistachios? Or how about real butter in a dish of butter pecan?
Such weighty questions about a favorite summertime confection could soon be decided by the courts.
A federal judge in New York has given the go-ahead to a Long Island woman’s class action lawsuit that claims consumers are being duped by Cold Stone Creamery when they purchase certain flavors that “do not contain their represented ingredients.”
Lead plaintiff Jenna Marie Duncan purchased her serving of pistachio ice cream from a Cold Stone Creamery store in Levittown, New York, in or around July 2022. According her lawsuit, Duncan “reasonably believed that the Pistachio ice cream she purchased from defendant contained pistachio.”
So is “artificially sweetened”, “natural sweeteners added” or any host of other, more useful descriptors.
Product nutrition labels are not the place for “it’s technically correct” phrasing.
That description doesn’t communicate if there is any sugar (calories) in it or not. That label would be accurate on a zero calorie or full calorie beverage.
The term you’re looking for is “unsweetened”. That tells you there’s no natural or artificial sweeteners in it.
I understand this. My point is “zero sugar” and “no sugar” are obtuse terms and much better ones exist.
Using a man-made sweetener? Call it artificially sweetened.
Using a natural sweetener other than sugar? Say so, it’s not hard and also less of a misdirection than the phrasing they like to use.
I think you’re looking at these labels thinking they are there to solve your problem of labeling a beverage that isn’t sweet (by any means). They aren’t.
These labels are there because most buyers of beverages are interested in if they contain calories or not. So the “zero sugar” clearly solves that.
Unless enough buyers are like you that they are seeking an unsweetened beverage, you’re out of luck looking for every beverage to be labeled as “sweet” or “not sweet”.
You’re probably right. Part of the reason it sets me off is because I assume they’re doing it on purpose. Maybe they are and I’m (partially) justified and maybe I’m attributing malice to stupidity or however that saying goes.
Fortunately this is a relatively infrequent occurrence as I’ve found the products I like. But god damn does it upset me when I pick up the wrong thing.
I don’t think they’re trying to trick people into drinking sweet drinks. I think they’re trying to appeal to their largest customer base (calorie conscious buyers). There is limited attention buyers have, so drink makers have to be careful not to put too much, so their most important parts of their message get through. In this case “zero sugar”. They are probably aware that some people like yourself end up with something you don’t like, but they just don’t care because it doesn’t negatively effect enough people for their sales to suffer.
So not really malice, or stupidity on their part, but apathy. They likely know, they just don’t care.