Episode 1 Rip Off Food

Food - it's big business.

Now, each year, we spend something like £5,000

per household on food and drink.

So, the competition for your pound is tough.

We'll leave no shelf untouched in our quest to champion YOU,

the weekly shopper.

This is the series in which we'll be exposing the hidden rip-offs

and letting you in on the tricks of the food trade.

And, most importantly, we'll show you how to be a smart shopper.

Welcome to Rip Off Food.

Today we're decoding some of the mysteries of food labelling.

That is really... How can they do that?

We'll show you the tricks that supermarkets use

to get their products into your basket.

And some soups that may not contain quite what you'd expect.

It's a big con, really, isn't it?

It's just a total big con.

And we find out why a prize-winning pasty maker is unhappy with

the logo designed to protect heritage foods.

You know, these days clued-up shoppers have to be label literate.

Because it's an elementary fact that manufacturers

use very clever packaging to pull us in to start spending money.

And I hope to show you today how that

plays around with your senses and confuses the mind.

You never know, after this,

you might never look at a supermarket shelf

in the same way ever again...

The government regularly encourages us to stay well,

with campaigns promoting the benefits of healthy living.

One of the best known, and perhaps most successful,

is the message that we should eat

five portions of fruit and vegetables a day.

The 5 A Day campaign has been around for almost a decade.

It's a phrase that been drilled into the nation's psyche.

You know, there are so many ways we can be manipulated by marketing.

And in these health-conscious times a food that claims to be

one of our five a day is obviously very attractive.

But are we kidding ourselves

when we pick up a tasty-looking meal,

believing that the 5 A Day label

allows us to stay healthy while we eat it?

There's an official 5 A Day logo that can only be

awarded by the Department Of Health.

To qualify, a food product should contain at least one

portion of fruit or veg and have no added salt, sugar or fat.

Nearly 250 licence holders are signed up

but you could argue, it's not instantly recognisable.

5 A Day, did you say?

I don't recognise the logo but I recognise, of course,

the phrase "five a day".

It looks like, perhaps, a new logo.

I think I've seen the expression rather than the logo, actually.

The 5 A Day campaign is based on the idea that 400 grams

of fruit and veg a day can protect against conditions like cancers,

heart disease, strokes and others.

So, the maths is - five portions of 80 grams each, a day, minimum.

Dietician Emer Delany thinks the message is simple.

The majority of fruit and veg

classify as one of your five a day, just as long as they are

an 80 gram portion, which equates to an apple, an orange, erm,

some small fruits or any berries

that'll fit into the palm of your hand.

The exception to this would be potatoes,

which are considered a starchy carbohydrate.

So, if you eat 80 grams of fresh fruit or veg,

you know that you're getting one of your five a day.

But more recently, the slogan has been hijacked

by food manufacturers making processed foods.

Some are using the phrase to highlight

the best parts of their products

to distract us from ingredients that might be less good for us,

like sugar, salt or fat.

There are a huge amount of products that use the 5 A Day messaging.

For example, the ready meals, microwave meals

and some snacks here at the front.

A lot of the products in front of us here

have got high levels of fat, sugar and salt.

So, it's quite confusing for consumers

because they also see the 5 A Day messaging on them.

So, let's start with a tasty-looking ready meal.

It's labelled as one of your five a day.

So, in this product here, you are getting some fruit and veg -

so a pepper, some onion and some peas, which make up 80 grams.

This product also provides you with almost three grams of salt,

which is half the amount of salt you're meant to have in one day.

But when you sprinkle that amount of salt on the veg,

it's not so appetising.

This is a lot of salt to have in one meal, and again if you're to serve

these vegetables to someone covered in salt, they wouldn't eat it.

Now, we know potatoes don't count,

so how do fish and chips get a 5 A Day slogan?

So, with this dish we're clearly NOT getting

the 5 A Day from the fish or the chips.

So, it's obviously coming from the peas.

Here's one of your five a day which comes with 22 grams of fat.

So, this is almost a third

of the recommended amount of fat to have in a day.

And this is bad because some fats are bad for your heart,

such as saturated fat.

And they're not very good if you're trying to lose weight.

So, we decided to make our own "One Of Your 5 A Day Puddings",

that's got the necessary 80 grams of strawberries per portion.

But it's got a whole load of custard and cream as well. Yum!

But if manufacturers can legally label this with the 5 A Day slogan,

promoted by the Government, doesn't it undermine the whole idea?

'When you have a question to ask, I believe it's always best to

'go to the top.

'So, I took our 5 A Day pudding to Westminster for a meeting

'with Anne Milton who, at that time, was the Junior Minister for Health.'

THEY CHATTER

Oh, my goodness.

A rather delicious-looking trifle. OK.

Imagine if you look at this in terms of health and strength.

That, in particular, I dare say,

you wouldn't have brought it along unless it was loaded with fat.

Well, it's a good home-made trifle, which a lot of people indulge in.

-Is it?

-OK, so it's got 80 grams of strawberries per person,

so that would be my one a day.

But it also has, per person, 59 grams of sugar per helping.

And - this is horrific, I think -

it's got 79.4 grams of fat.

That's phenomenal, actually. And so, of course, we wouldn't give it

our logo because it's got added sugar and fat, to start off with.

And you're right, you say, of course, you - the Government -

you wouldn't give that your logo.

But, the problem is it's been hijacked under the 5 A Day tag.

Because so many people are using it now. How much does it bother you,

the fact that it has been hijacked?

It does bother me but people play with words

and you see it all the time.

I think there is evidence that the tide has turned a little bit.

Manufacturers do want to behave more responsibly.

I think there's nobody who's not aware of the fact that,

you know, 60% of the adult population is now overweight or obese.

We have a problem.

What we need to do is make sure that consumers have the information

they need, in which the demand from the manufactures of food,

what they want, in order to lead a healthier lifestyle.

But it's a confusing market out there at the moment.

It is. The consumers go along to the shop

and they look for their logo -

I just happen to have brought my pot of raisins with me.

Erm, so here is the logo, er, the Government logo.

I'm going to be absolutely honest -

until today, honestly, I'm not aware of this logo at all.

I don't mean to offend but, I think it's rather insignificant looking.

No, you're... It doesn't offend me at all.

The logo's been in place since 2003.

It's had a desired effect in as much as it raised awareness that

people should eat their five a day.

I think you're right, though,

that recognition of the logo isn't very high,

and that leads us in danger of the logo being hijacked.

The Department Of Health reiterated to us that products had to meet

their strict criteria to get their logo and said that products which

have their own logo on them tended to be ones that wouldn't eligible.

We asked the Food And Drink Federation if they agreed

that food manufacturers are misusing the phrase.

They said that, currently there is

no Government advice on how to use a 5 A Day label on composite products.

And the Institute Of Grocery Distribution

has developed best-practice guidance,

which includes nutritional standards,

to guide retailers and manufacturers

who want to label their products responsibly.

In a multi-million-pound market, food manufacturers

and retailers are after your hard-earned cash.

And they'll use all their marketing know-how to entice you

into buying their goods - even going as far as inventing

some of the places where their products come from.

So, what's happening these days is that supermarkets, in order to

stay ahead of the competition, are personalising products

to give them idyllic names.

You know, conjuring up all those

pictures of rural countryside and unique locations.

It creates a sense of small-scale farming when, in actual fact,

these products are mass produced in many different locations.

They come up with evocative titles for product ranges

such as "Ashfield Farm", used by Aldi.

"Willow Farm", a Tesco range of chickens.

And "Lochmuir Salmon" by M&S.

Ashfield and Willow are named after

a farm, but not all the products in the range come from there.

And Lochmuir, well, we'll come to that in a second.

It's only when you look closer that you find out the truth,

and there's nothing illegal about it.

So, the M&S range of Lochmuir salmon may be from Scotland

but on face value it sounds like it comes from a specific

and idyllic-sounding location.

Let's see if the good people of Edinburgh

are taken in by this mythical place?

The name makes you assume that it's probably

the Highlands, somewhere like that. Somewhere near Inverness.

West Coast.

The Great Glen on the West Coast, but I've not heard of that loch.

You'd expect it's a loch somewhere, you know, the name of a loch,

but I've haven't heard of that, so...

Lochmuir, never heard of it.

Uh-oh, smells a bit fishy to me.

And there's a reason why no-one's ever heard of it.

Lochmuir is a trademark for Marks & Spencer.

It is a brand that exists for them to promote their farmed salmon.

There's no such place as Lochmuir - that means lake of the sea -

which is where it's water near the sea. It is only as arbitrary as that.

It doesn't actually exist as a place.

And the problem, for me, is that a shopper could go into that store

and pick that up and think it's from a place that exists, and it doesn't.

To sell products they'll do anything.

I wouldn't expect them to mislead, no.

If you saw something with "loch" from Scotland,

you would think it was a place.

So, Lochmuir doesn't exist,

it's just a place dreamt up by the M&S marketing team.

But it's not only M&S.

To add an air of quality to one of their range of chicken products,

Tesco have called it "Willow Farm Chicken".

That is really... How can they do that?

They shouldn't be allowed to state that it's a Willow Farm product,

if it doesn't come from a farm called Willow Farm.

Most of us go to only a few places to buy our food,

and they have to find ways to look different.

And one of the ways to look different is to look small

and pretend our food is from a specific place.

There's nothing illegal about describing your product with

a particular marketing term,

but I believe it's misleading if it doesn't exist as a place.

So, how carefully, then, do you have to study a label to make sure

that what you're buying is what it actually says on the label?

Well, one thing you CAN do is to look for a trademark sign,

and if you see this,

it's a good indication that the name could be made up.

Of course, many of the supermarkets are employing these

tricks of the trade.

When we asked M&S, Tesco and Aldi

why they're making up names for their products,

this is what they told us. M&S responded,

"Lochmuir is a collective way of representing a number of farms,

"and was chosen to recognise the Scottish provenance of the fish."

Tesco said, "All the chickens are British and come from a number of

"farms, one of which is called Willow Farm."

Aldi said, "Ashfield Farm is a brand name

"and does not mean that they source the meat from one farm."

They added that, within the range, they sell 100% British meat.

So, who, then, are these masters of illusion who create

the packing that lures us all in?

There aren't many brand designers who will stand up

and be counted when it comes to revealing

the tricks of the trade, but I've managed to find one.

-Gary, good morning. How are you?

-Good morning.

'Gary Marshall is a leading brand designer with over

'a decade of experience under his belt.'

We've been, actually, on the programme doing some research

and looking at labels and things. And, for example,

we have here the Lochmuir salmon.

Now, as I understand it, Lochmuir doesn't even exist.

That's correct, yes.

Really, what these companies are trying to do is to create a story.

So therefore, if you've got places that sound real,

you can imagine what this fish is going to be like.

So, in this case what you're trying to imply is this lovely

Scottish, outdoor, healthy kind of...

Correct, yes. It's a good, healthy food,

that's had a good life.

Because people are emotional, so therefore when they see this,

the image they've got in their mind can be a little bit more detailed,

and a little bit more detail makes it a bit more real.

If you just say it's just a generic... It could be anything.

You know, sometimes facts tell, emotions sell.

OK. So, this one is Willow Farm chicken breast fillets.

If you have an idea of what that place is, then you've made

that image yourself.

It's a nice countryside, open fields,

so you're going to imagine your chickens

running around in nice sunny country fields, being corn fed...

You just plant it in my mind.

I'm just planting it.

'I've brought a little present along for Gary.

'I want him to show me

'how this seemingly mundane string of sausages could be transformed

'into something that would stand out on a supermarket shelf.'

'He's created a selection of labels just for my sausages,

'but be warned, you won't find any of these in the shops.'

As the designer, what do you feel is drawing me

to this design, for example?

This one is very much using the dark colours of black,

because black's a bit more sort of, premium, elegant.

So, you would expect a nice rich-flavour sausage, on this one.

And you used the word "premium", of course.

Yes, I mean, again, as we all know in marketing,

we can all use these words - premium, prime cuts -

to bring out that, sort of, more, probably a better range of sausage.

And, of course, you've put the various stamps of approval.

Yeah, if you notice here we've, sort of, got the pig looking down towards

this to emphasis the UK Quality Pork, which is important to consumers.

'Now, the logos here are all for genuine accredited schemes -

'they can only be used if the product

'is certified by those organisations.

'So, my sausages would have to meet their strict standards.

'But if they did, it seems a clever designer knows just how to

'bring that to the consumers' attention.

'And what about the pretty pictures?'

Again, this one, we're using imagery, the pigs here have clearly

got a lot of space, very nice light, earthy colours.

I noticed that you called them

Lincolnshire Sausages, even though my sausages might not necessarily

be made in Lincolnshire. If I fancy the name, I can still use it?

Erm, only if it's made in the recipe way of Lincolnshire.

If you're not doing the flavouring as a Lincolnshire sausage

and it's not coming from Lincolnshire,

then you wouldn't be able to do it.

Hence the reason why you would probably

make up a place name, as some people have, and put it on there.

If you look at the illustration,

there's nothing there that saying how the pigs have been brought up.

You've used the "home-made" very strongly there, haven't you?

Yeah, I mean, again it's more personal...

'Food Standards Agency guidance says that the term "home-made" should be

'used when preparation reflects a typical domestic situation.'

Looking at things like the fonts, again, it can add emotion,

to the different style of font you're using.

Again, things like sizes, you've only got a split second

when the consumer first sees it, so again make it very clear what it is.

The secondary text, as we would call it, is more a description.

For this one we've just put, "Traditionally made sausages

"using only the finest prime cuts, mixed with our unique

"blend of seasoning and natural casings."

So, you'd get away with it,

no matter what the quality of sausage, would you?

Yes, you probably would do.

Some people would tell you there's an artistic licence in some things.

I think there's a lot of artistic licence, to be honest.

So, my advice is, finally,

don't be lured or led astray by the

rustic and rural-sounding names on the packages.

Always read the small print.

Find out exactly where the product comes from and

if there's no information, then the best advice is to ask the retailer.

Some foods don't need to pretend to be from somewhere,

as they're named after the place they originate from.

Take Cornish pasties.

They're often stamped with a badge of honour to prove

they come from Cornwall.

Now, these logos are called PGIs or PDOs,

but what they're telling you can be tough to figure out.

I have no idea on that one.

Never, ever, ever seen the yellow symbol before.

I don't know what that means.

I'm not familiar with that, myself.

So, it means where it's produced is, maybe, environmentally friendly?

Now, I'll let you into a trade secret.

A PGI is a Protected Geographical Indication

and a PDO is Protected Designation Of Origin.

Are you any the wiser?

Well, 53 British foods can wear these logos with pride.

Now, these PGIs and PDOs are the labels that put

the Cornish in the pasty and the Jersey in Jersey Royals.

They were dreamt up by the bureaucrats in Brussels,

with the idea of protecting heritage food right across Europe.

They're to stop champagne growers in France, for example,

being undercut by cheap fizz imports.

And now, the scheme has been extended -

everything from bangers and beer to those Cornish pasties.

To be a PDO, the food has to be produced

and processed in a particular area.

But for a PGI, only one of the

stages of production or preparation needs to take place there.

And that's the rub.

Because while it should be a badge of authenticity and quality,

some feel it favours big business over artisan food-makers.

Simon Byron-Edmund makes traditional Cornish pasties,

but since the introduction of the PGI, he can't market them as such,

because he's based in Devon.

In 2009 we won best pasty in the country,

and we were then banned in 2010 because we weren't from Cornwall.

Today, Simon is simply out to prove a point.

He's going to show us why a PGI

might not be all that it's cracked up to be.

The border of Devon and Cornwall

runs through the centre of this bridge over the River Tamar.

To the left lies Cornwall, and to the right is Devon.

And stuck in the middle of the two counties is Simon.

He'll be making two pasties, one on either side of the border,

but only one of them

has the right to be called a Cornish pasty under PGI guidelines.

Let's see what's going into the pasty on the Cornish side.

Well, these, we've got some nice Israeli potatoes here.

We've got a little Swede here

that's come from somewhere in the Eastern Bloc.

A little Chilean onion and we've got a bit of British beef,

but this could have come from anywhere.

It could have come from Argentina or Brazil.

And in the other one, on the Devon side...

So, we've got a lovely bit of beef skirt all the way from Cornwall.

Some Cornish onion.

Bit of lovely Cornish swede, and some potatoes that we got from Cornwall.

Simon's preparing both pasties using a traditional recipe -

the only difference is where the ingredients have come from.

Over it goes, make sure everything's tucked in.

You can put all sorts of crimps on pasties. No...

It could stay like that,

but we're little rope crimp, this will just hold it together.

It might contain foreign ingredients,

but the fact that it's been assembled in Cornwall

gives this pasty protected Cornish status.

But what about the pasty that Simon's been assembling

on the Devon side of the bridge, using 100% Cornish ingredients?

So, here we have a classic, iconic, side-crimped pasty,

made in the classic Cornish style.

But because I'm six inches into Devon,

this cannot be called a Cornish pasty. This, in fact, is a pasty.

Simon's off to the pub for a taste test.

That's very good.

His Devon pasties made with Cornish ingredients

seem to have won the day.

I prefer the taste of that one.

Simon can pat himself on the back for his great baking

but he'll never make the PGI grade whilst his business is in Devon.

A pasty should have high meat content,

it should be made with good provenance local ingredients.

That's what a good pasty should be about.

Unfortunately, the bar has been set a little bit low for the PGI,

whereby you don't have to buy within a region,

you don't HAVE to buy within a region.

I'm not suggesting that some companies don't,

but you don't HAVE to.

We asked DEFRA to comment, they said

that it's the applicant who chooses whether to apply for a PDO or a PGI.

And that the production process, raw materials

and ability to justify the products' link to the area will be

a major factor in determining which is the most appropriate.

The Cornish Pasty Association told us, "PGI and PDO classifications are

"related specifically to authenticity

"and the origin of the product.

"As those features can themselves be an indication of quality,

"it is not the case that the classifications

"are not a guarantee of quality.

"The purpose of the law

"is to protect the reputation of regional foods,

"promote rural and agricultural activity,

"help producers obtain a premium price for their authentic products,

"and eliminate unfair competition

"or misleading consumers by non-genuine products."

So, a PDO logo should be a dead giveaway for what you're getting.

Like on this Cornish cream, it shows that it comes from Cornwall.

But how about another great British staple - chicken soup?

You'd expect it to have some chicken meat in it,

otherwise, they couldn't call it chicken soup, could they?

But some soups have more chicken in them than others.

Now, we're not talking clear chicken broth.

When we looked at a sample of 20 soups to see which one came

top of the pecking order when it came to actual chicken content,

we were shocked to find out how much, or indeed, how little meat

they actually contained.

Even the top ones in our sample only contained 8%.

But at the other end of the scale,

the worst offender had a chicken content of just 0.5%.

Now, I don't know about you but, to me, shopping should be simple.

And when you pick up a product, it should absolutely clear

what you're buying simply by looking at the label.

We found many examples

where there's a scant amount of the ingredients you might expect to eat

when you glance at the name of the product.

Let's have look at this one. This is guacamole-style topping.

When you check the label on this one, it only has 3% avocado in it,

so it surely is a style.

And this, probably, is the worst example I have in my current basket,

because it's chicken and mushroom -

a pasta sauce with chicken and mushroom -

But when you check it,

there's only 1% mushroom and no chicken whatsoever.

It's just chicken flavour.

That word "flavour" is a classic on packets.

Under the regulations,

a chicken "flavour" soup does not have to contain any trace

of real chicken in it whatsoever.

But, if you stick an E and D on the end of flavour

to make it "flavoured",

then that changes the meaning completely.

If something's referred to as "flavoured",

then it's derived from the real thing.

Still not terribly reassuring, is it?

The use of the word "flavour" is really

used by manufactures to indicate that

there isn't, generally speaking,

the product in there.

So, for instance, beef-flavour crisps don't necessarily have beef in them.

Now, we want to find out if people, generally, are aware

of how little chicken meat

manufacturers get away with putting in your soup.

So, we're off to an East End market in London

to carry out a little experiment.

Our researchers set up a stall

and laid out these three plates of chicken.

Which would people expect to find in an average sized

can of chicken soup?

Would it be 100 grams, 50 grams or just 10 grams?

I think about that much.

That would be too much.

That's not enough. I'd say the one in the middle.

Obviously I'd like that amount in it.

For a soup, I would point to this.

They're all way off the mark.

Even the soup from our survey with the MOST chicken had a whole

two grams less than the smallest dish.

It's a big con, really, isn't it? It's just a total big con.

I'm never going to eat chicken soup again.

-Make your own, that's the answer.

-Make your own...!

So, just how little meat could a manufacturer add

and still call it chicken soup?

We got in touch with DEFRA, which is the Government department

responsible for food policy and regulation,

to find out the definitive answer.

They told us that there is - now, wait for this -

there is no minimum amount of the key ingredient.

No amount whatsoever is specified in the regulations.

So therefore, a chicken soup with just 0.00001% of chicken

would actually still qualify as a chicken soup.

I think you'll agree, absolutely unbelievable.

And there's one important regulation everybody should know about.

The ingredients listed on the back of a package are always

in quantity order, starting with the most plentiful at the top.

Except for flavourings that don't add up to any more than 2%.

So, for instance,

if you want plenty of cheese in your sauce or apple in your crumble,

make sure it's high up on the list -

that way you know exactly what you're buying.

The reality is that food labelling is a nightmare.

And the trick is never to take anything at face value.

But hopefully now, when you're out shopping,

at least you'll know what to look out for

to avoid some of those marketing traps set up by the retailers.

Remember, all the information is on the pack.

The trouble is, it's in very, very small writing.

So watch out, or at least bring your glasses.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd