Can supermarkets help turn the tide on obesity?

In brief

Retailers and manufacturers came together to improve the health of their consumers, a collaboration facilitated through their membership with The Consumer Goods Forum. They ran a series of trials over the course of a year, starting in Lambeth and Southwark but with a view to scale the interventions that worked.

Executive summary

Companies trialled a total of 34 interventions using a range of approaches to improve the healthiness of consumer baskets. In-store trials were prioritised and included changes to pricing and promotions, availability, choice architecture, shelf and nutritional labelling as well as social feedback techniques. With support from Guy’s & St Thomas’ Foundation (through Impact on Urban Health), the University of Oxford evaluated some of these trials (see summary table below). Together, they found that:

• Companies were able to influence the healthiness of consumer shopping baskets
• Impactful trials could be relatively simple and commercially sustainable
• Trials that both increase the purchase of healthier foods and decrease the purchase of less healthy foods are required to support healthier diets
• Trials using pricing and promotional tactics, increasing the availability of healthier options and some choice architecture trials have shown a significant and positive impact
• Whilst there remains outstanding questions about these trials – including how long the improvements can be sustained – we can clearly see the potential for companies to improve consumer health and shape consumer demand
• Not all trials were successful, and the analyses suggests that shelf labelling and social feedback tactics may not be as impactful unless paired with other changes