Do Consumers Want More Nutritional and Health Information on Wine Labels? Insights from the EU and USA.

Azzurra Annunziata,Angela Mariani,Eugenio Pomarici,Riccardo Vecchio

doi:10.3390/nu8070416

Abstract

The global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol launched in 2010 by the World Health Organization includes, amongst several areas of recommended actions, providing consumer information about, and labelling, alcoholic beverages to indicate alcohol-related harm. Labelling requirements worldwide for alcoholic drinks are currently quite diverse and somewhat limited compared to labelling on food products and on tobacco. In this context, the current paper contributes to the academic and political debate on the inclusion of nutritional and health information on wine labelling, providing some insights into consumer interest in, and preferences for, such information in four core wine-producing and -consuming countries: Italy, France, Spain, and the United States of America. A rating-based conjoint analysis was performed in order to ascertain consumer preferences for different formats of additional information on wine labels, and a segmentation of the sample was performed to determine the existence of homogeneous groups of consumers in relation to the degrees of usefulness attached to the nutritional and health information on wine labels. Our results highlight the interest expressed by European and United States consumers for introducing nutrition and health information on wine labels. However, the results of conjoint analysis show some significant differences among stated preferences of the information delivery modes in different countries. In addition, segmentation analysis reveal the existence of significant differences between consumer groups with respect to their interest in receiving additional information on wine labels. These differences are not only linked to the geographic origin of the consumers, or to socio-demographic variables, but are also related to wine consumption habits, attitudes towards nutritional information, and the degree of involvement with wine. This heterogeneity of consumer preferences indicates a need for a careful consideration of wine labelling regulations and merits further investigation in order to identify labelling guidelines in terms of the message content and presentation method to be used.

Highlights

Alcohol misuse ranks among the top five risk factors for disease, disability, and death throughout the world and has serious social and economic consequences for individuals other than the drinker and for society at large [1]
Labelling requirements on alcoholic drinks worldwide differ greatly [3,4,5] and are generally rather limited in scope compared to labelling on food products and on other products considered damaging to health such as tobacco
With specific reference to wine attributes, it should be considered that, as suggested by Mueller et al [72], direct measurements of packaging attribute importance may not reveal true preferences. This would suggest considerable caution in using direct importance measures. Despite their proven negative impact on health and society arising from excess consumption or abuse, alcoholic beverages have benefited from special treatment

Summary

Introduction

Alcohol misuse ranks among the top five risk factors for disease, disability, and death throughout the world and has serious social and economic consequences for individuals other than the drinker and for society at large [1]. Labelling requirements on alcoholic drinks worldwide differ greatly [3,4,5] and are generally rather limited in scope compared to labelling on food products and on other products considered damaging to health such as tobacco. While there is a trend globally towards mandatory nutritional information in food product labelling regulation, hailed as an important instrument in promoting healthier eating habits [6], alcoholic beverages are generally exempted from such legislation. Lately in the European Union, according to Regulation (EU) 1169/2011 on the provision of food information, alcoholic beverages have been temporarily exempted from nutritional labelling obligation. Unlike what has been done for tobacco labelling, few countries have introduced mandatory warning labels on alcoholic beverages. Other countries have introduced different kinds of mandatory health warnings on alcohol, including

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