Food safety laws indicate that all ingredients should be listed and allergens highlighted for consumer safety and information. Concentrating on what is missing from a product can be essential when you’re aiming for a target audience (gluten-free, sugar-free, dairy-free etc.)

The ‘free from’ movement, as well as government lead schemes such as the sugar tax, is encouraging consumers to look for alternatives to ingredients that are deemed bad for us when consumed in larger quantities. Consumers looking for a healthier diet and lifestyle are on the search for ingredients that won’t affect the taste, or offer a healthy addition to a product.

Food expert Jane Milton recently argued that focusing more on what you are adding to your products could also be a big selling point, especially when it comes to functionality. [On adding ground almonds to brownies] “If you’re adding something as simple as ground almonds you’re putting in fibre, protein, magnesium and good fats. It’s not a difficult thing to sometimes swap out a bit of an ingredient, swap in something else and add value.”

Jane goes on to focus on the importance of using ingredients that the consumer understands “If you add something that consumers understand and can visualise when they see it on a label, then that product is more likely to be a success.”

In addition to legislative requirements to clearly show allergen information, brands can use the ingredients list to highlight alternative ingredients or those with added health benefits.

Allergen information is crucial to the production and ensuring your labels abide by the current laws, CLARiSOFT label design software, used across all ICE printers, allows to you emphasise ingredients by underlining, italicising, emboldening or highlighting words. The software is simple to use, as everything is based in a Windows GUI (graphical user interface) and can be altered accordingly within the software itself.

Your label design can be a great way to promote alternative ingredients and ingredients with added health benefits. Using label design software such as CLARiSUITE gives you the opportunity to highlight ingredients at the touch of a button.

For more information on how ICE coders and labelling software can help your business, get in touch with one of our friendly coding and marking experts on enquiries@uk.interactivecoding.com