That’s the news coming out from BetterRetailing.com this week as Public Health England launches its campaign to limit children’s snacks to 100 calories.

When applied to the top 25 lines in crisps, chocolate blocks, chocolate bars and sugar confectionery categories, the criteria that aims to prevent children from eating more than two 100-calorie snacks per day found that only one product fell under the 100-calorie cap – Tic Tac Line & Orange 18g.

A comparison of the top lines listed in Retail News’ ‘What to Stock guide 2017’ revealed that the average top 25 crisp lines contained more than 400 calories and the average chocolate bar contained nearly 250 calories.

The campaign is based around a Change4Life app that will allow consumers to scan barcodes to check calorie, sugar, salt and saturated fat levels in each line, but what else can retailers do to communicate this level of information? If you don’t have the app, you are never going to know, and in reality, who’s got the time to take their phone out and scan each item to check on the nutritional value of each item?

The answer is much simpler – give customers the information they need on the shelf edge ticket.

Since the late 80’s retailers have used shelf edge tickets to display pricing to customers and inform staff where products go on the shelf yet amazingly the modest shelf edge ticket has barely evolved at all. Shelf Edge Tickets are still being churned out from the retailers’ EPoS systems using very basic software with unimaginative designs – simple Black and White tickets printed with an occasional coloured box for the price is about as creative as it gets. Very little over the past 38 years has moved on.

The most valuable real estate every retailer owns – the shelf edge – is still massively underutilised, underinvested, and in general, ignored when initiatives like this latest one from Change4Life comes along. The shelf edge should be viewed as the primary platform from which to promote, educate and engage with customers.

Print Controller brings significant advances over legacy ticketing solutions – tickets can be printed locally in-store or centrally distributed, in full colour (essential for highlighting key nutritional information with Red, Amber and Green indicators) and can include additional visual content (such as product imagery, brand logos) and information that helps promote an emotional connection with the product.

Tickets can even include QR codes, product review scores and comparative pricing from other retailers all designed to build confidence, promote value and assist customers in finding out more about the product. Trials have proven that by including colour, rich product information and imagery on shelf edge tickets, product sales increased by between 6% and 30%.

Contact RMS today on 02380 816000 or drop us a line here to health check your shelf edge ticketing and support Public Health England.

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