Supervalu Inc., parent company of Jewel-Osco, the Chicago area's largest grocery chain, on Wednesday unveiled a labeling system aimed at giving shoppers a simpler way to decipher nutrition levels in food.
The tags are aimed at helping shoppers identify healthier options, and are expected to ultimately cover about 10 percent of the items in a store.
It's the latest example of the food industry trying to give consumers easy-to-use nutrition information. Federal law requires detailed data on food packages, but it's complicated and in small print.
Supervalu's system involves putting color-coded tags on grocery shelves, initially for about 4,200 items. For instance, foods that are considered excellent or good sources of fiber will be denoted by orange tags, while low-calorie foods will be represented by a purple tag.
Color-coded tags also will be used on foods that are low in saturated fat and salt; that are excellent or good sources of protein and calcium; or that have a certain amount of whole grains.
"We want to be a conduit of nutritional information," said Jeff Noddle, Supervalu's chief executive. "We thought this way was the simplest way for consumers to understand."
Supervalu's system is expected to appear in Chicago-area Jewel stores in May.
"I think it will be a useful program," said Michael Jacobson, head of the food labeling watchdog Center for Science in the Public Interest. "But it's competing with a bunch of other programs."
Packaged food manufacturers routinely affix their own "better-for-you" labels on products they deem healthy. To cut through the clutter, a group of the nation's largest food companies, including Northfield-based Kraft Foods Inc., said last fall they plan to unveil a standard nutrition label -- called Smart Choices -- on healthier offerings.
It's conceivable that products winning a healthy label from a food manufacturer may not receive the same from a supermarket such as Supervalu -- and vice versa, Jacobson said. To add to the mix, other retailers are devising their own nutrition-scoring systems.
Dominick's, the Chicago area's second-largest grocery chain, doesn't have a rating system for branded foods. But it does have color-coded labeling on its proprietary Eating Right line of about 300 items. The color codes designate attributes like "low cholesterol" or "fat free."
Meanwhile, Topco, a Skokie-based grocery cooperative owned by about 60 supermarket chains, has teamed up with a Yale University doctor and is rolling out a rating system that ranks food on a one to 100 scale, the higher the healthier.
Minnesota-based Supervalu developed its system in conjunction with the Joslin Clinic, which is affiliated with Harvard University's medical school. The labels are based on federal government nutrition guidelines.
Eventually, Supervalu expects that about 10 percent of the more than 60,000 products in its stores will carry a color-coded label.
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