More on Ribena's vitamin C claims
Posted by kathryn in Food Labelling, Kid's nutrition and Food & Health Myths
Following the recent court case highlighting msleading claims about the nutritional content of Ribena, GlaxoSmithKline have withdrawn the vitamin C statement from it’s packaging. As John Sayers, Manager Consumer Healthcare in Australia says on their website:
“Recently you may have heard about some issues relating to Ribena “ready to drink” products. We stated that some Ribena products contained a level of Vitamin C that was incorrect. The testing method used to determine the level of Vitamin C was unreliable and we were unaware of this at the time. Testing methods revealed that Vitamin C levels in a number of our ‘ready-to-drink’ products deteriorated over time and did not meet the Vitamin C level stated on the nutritional information on the pack. We’ve removed the Vitamin C claim from our packaging to reflect this. We’re also in the process of changing our testing methods and are working to improve these products to ensure this can never happen again.”
“We also made the claim that ‘…blackcurrants in Ribena contain four times the Vitamin C of oranges.’ This may have misled you to believe that Ribena contains four times the level of Vitamin C than in the same quantity of orange juice. That was never our intention and is incorrect. We are sincerely sorry for any confusion caused.”
They’ve also launched a TV campaign to apologise to consumers.
Even before it’s vitamin C claims were found to be untrue, Ribena wasn’t a health food. In January Choice included Ribena Blackcurrant Fruit Drink (the ready to drink stuff) in their list of ten foods that make kids fatter faster . The major ingredients in these drinks are not blackcurrants, but sugar and water. In fact the fruit only makes up 5% of the final drink. While the water is good, the sugar isn’t and at 215kJ per 100ml it has more kilojoules than coke.
For more information see the SMH , Choice and Ribena’s website .
08 May, 2007
Comments
That kind of information can be very destructive. Claiming that their product has 4 time more vitamin c than the other brand when in fact it doesn’t wasn’t a smart move.
It’s a good thing that they took back their claims. The wrong information which they proudly introduced to the public could have caused some serious problems with their comsumers.
Pat & Alex, thanks for your comments. Ribena have been caught out making a silly mistake and I still think it’s going to cause them problems. Yes, they are going all-out to reassure consumers and re-gain their standing in the community, but recent events have highlighted that Ribena is not a health food, which I think will make many parents think twice. Plus people don’t like to be taken for a ride, so I’m imagining the backlash will continue a while yet.
[...] I was thinking about the recent Ribena apology last night and in particular the statement: The testing method used to determine the level of Vitamin C was unreliable and we were unaware of this at the time. Testing methods revealed that Vitamin C levels in a number of our ‘ready-to-drink’ products deteriorated over time and did not meet the Vitamin C level stated on the nutritional information on the pack. [...]
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