Wednesday 20 August 2008

Julian Graves Responds to 'Sugar Pushers' Post (Worst Sugar Pushers Part 2)

The Worst Sugar Pushers of all: Health Food Stores
Julian Graves Responds to 'Sugar Pushers' Post (Worst Sugar Pushers Part 2)
The Worst Sugar Pushers of All Part 3 - Holland and Barrett Takes Centre Stage

I was pleased to receive an email from a representative of Julian Graves yesterday in response to my post The Worst Sugar Pushers of all: Health Food Stores. Here is what they said:

First of all, we are not a health food store and have never positioned ourselves as such. We market ourselves as a specialist food retailer.

Secondly, we believe very strongly in the 80:20 rule – ie eat healthily 80% of the time and allow yourself ‘a bit of what you fancy’ treats 20% of the time. (Gillian McKeith advocates 90:10 but many people find this is too rigid).

Thirdly, we do not market to children, our customer profile is 50+ who are probably well aware of the effects of eating sugar in their diet. We also do not promote our confectionery range in our instore literature except at Christmas, when we believe that if you can’t indulge yourself at Christmas, then when can you?

Fourthly, if people eat sugar in a sensible way, ie not all day, in small amounts and ensure they clean their teeth after eating sugary food, they should be ok.

Fifthly, all our products have the ingredients listed on the packaging so people know whether they contain sugar or not. We do not live in a police state (yet) where consumers’ purchases are monitored and censored. People have the right to make up their own mind about what they eat or don’t eat.

And finally, we do not sell alcohol, cigarettes or cigars which, to my mind, are far worse for you than a few sweets a day.


I will first say that I am grateful that they responded – they could easily have ignored me. So out of deference, I will try to exercise restraint.

Here are my responses:

First of all, we are not a health food store and have never positioned ourselves as such. We market ourselves as a specialist food retailer.
On your website’s About Us page you describe yourselves as '...the UK's largest independent specialist natural food and ingredients retailer…’ I don’t intend to get into a debate about semantics, but the term ‘natural food’ surely implies ‘health food’; and whilst you may say you do not position yourselves as a health food retailer, I believe most people see you as such. It would be rather snide of you to suggest this is pure accident. One more point - refined sugar has been highly processed, so I think most people would agree that foods containing it are therefore not natural. Even if we ignore my previous points and define your positioning by literal interpretation of your own website, you are selling products which fall outside the claimed scope.

Secondly, we believe very strongly in the 80:20 rule – ie eat healthily 80% of the time and allow yourself ‘a bit of what you fancy’ treats 20% of the time. (Gillian McKeith advocates 90:10 but many people find this is too rigid).
The fundamental problem with this approach is that sugar is an addictive substance. There is evidence in scientific literature (such as here), but more importantly many testimonies from people (such as here) to support this notion. You would not say to a smoker ‘only smoke 20% of the time’ and you will be fine, because you know they would not be able to do this. For many people, once their palate has been affected by sugary food, it is very hard to restrict its consumption to 80% of the time.

Thirdly, we do not market to children, our customer profile is 50+ who are probably well aware of the effects of eating sugar in their diet. We also do not promote our confectionery range in our instore literature except at Christmas, when we believe that if you can’t indulge yourself at Christmas, then when can you?
See my response to the final point.

Fourthly, if people eat sugar in a sensible way, ie not all day, in small amounts and ensure they clean their teeth after eating sugary food, they should be ok.

See my response to the second point – it’s addictive, so being sensible is a problem. Also, just so you know, cleaning your teeth straight after eating sugary food may be a bad idea. My dentist recently told me not to do it and the advice on the British Dental Health Foundation website says “It is best not to brush your teeth until at least one hour after eating.”

Fifthly, all our products have the ingredients listed on the packaging so people know whether they contain sugar or not. We do not live in a police state (yet) where consumers’ purchases are monitored and censored. People have the right to make up their own mind about what they eat or don’t eat.
See my point in the post about ingredients – not all people read or understand them. Since my central argument is that you are selling unhealthy food when people see you as a health food shop, I see little point in getting into a debate about consumer choice vs. state intervention.

And finally, we do not sell alcohol, cigarettes or cigars which, to my mind, are far worse for you than a few sweets a day.
I had to chuckle at this one. There is always something worse. If, in response to criticism, Marlboro proudly trumpeted that that they do not sell hard drugs to children, there would be laughter and outrage in equal measure. This is playground reasoning.

The Series:
The Worst Sugar Pushers of all: Health Food Stores
Julian Graves Responds to 'Sugar Pushers' Post (Worst Sugar Pushers Part 2)
The Worst Sugar Pushers of All Part 3 - Holland and Barrett Takes Centre Stage

See Also:
New York - Limited Cake Porn but Plenty of Sugar Pushers
New York Part 2 – Another Sugar Pusher and Cake Security Threat
We're all Junkies
Why (Refined) Sugar is Bad: Some References

5 comments:

My Year Without said...

Oh my gosh! I LOVE this! I just found your blog and am very inspired by your motivation to take this particular issue to the next level. I have dedicated myself to going without refined sugar for the year, and this information here is great! I totally agree that health food stores have taken advantage of people's plight to be healthy. To answer one of your questions, I live in the US, and health food stores have A LOT of unhealthy combined with healthy. The use of the word "natural" is not regulated very well by the FDA, so you see it all the time. Unfortunately, there are those who choose not to spend much time reading ingredients labels so they fall prey to borderline false advertising but feel good about themselves because they are shopping at a "health" food store. Going without sugar is somewhat of a joke when it comes to packaged foods. There are all sorts of fancy words for sugar, which people like to believe are healthier versions. However, all those names (raw sugar, evaporated cane juice, organic sugar, etc.) are all false advertising for sucrose.
Rarely do I find a cracker or even a loaf of bread that does not contain sugar. Luckily, where I live in Oregon, there are some REALLY healthy foods in some of our "health" food stores so I have lucked out with great sprouted wheat breads sweetened with honey, crackers unsweetened, but mostly to stay away from sugar I am eating whole foods.
I would highly recommend looking for "Nancy's Yogurt" or the "soy yogurt" by Nancy's if you are on the west coast. All her products are sweetened with a little honey but no sugar. I have heard from others, especially on the east coast that it is tremendously hard to find unsweetened yogurts.
Anyway, can't wait to read more of what you've been saying/blogging. Keep up the good work!

Methuselah said...

Thanks - sounds like you have all the same problems we do. You make a good point when you say that people go into these stores to feel good about themselves - this is a good way to describe the exploitative nature of the marketing strategies some of these health food stores employ.

As it happens, we are visiting the US next week, both East and West coasts, so I will look out for the products you mention.

Asclepius said...

Looks like you have rattled a few cages with this one ;)

In fairness to Julian Graves, they may proclaim that they 'search the world for natural foods', but they also have 'a thriving – and growing - range of retro sweets, selling old favourites like flying saucers, pear drops, mojos and shrimp shapes.' (http://www.juliangraves.com/?PageID=570&NewsID=264)

Maybe I could arbitrate in this issue? I hereby suggest that Julian Graves change their strapline to "Searching the world for natural foods...and unnatural, highly processed, addictive substances that have absolutely no claim to being healthy and which, in fact, may induce a negative bodily response at the hormonal level."

Methuselah said...

I think you may have a future in marketing ;-)

Asclepius said...

The JG branding is definitely aimed at the health food market. The language used on their website (words such as 'natural', 'whole', 'health' and articles on 'the power of eating raw'), are clearly aimed to appeal to a particular demographic.

Anyway, you might find this interesting...apparently sugar fries your brain...

http://conditioningresearch.blogspot.com/2008/08/sugar-fries-your-brain.html

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