Clean and clear: the backlash of the ‘healthy’ diet on social media

The BBC documentary “Clean Eating: The Dirty Truth,” has put a spotlight on the “wellness” diets promoted by some bloggers and social media personalities.

‘Wellness’ initially promoted smashing, blending, and chopping vegetables, berries, legumes, and seeds from exotic places that were meant to release uncountable benefits.

If the ingredient was little known, then all the better – with rarity it could easily gain the title of ‘super’, referring to its extra nutritional value. Other unlucky basic foods were banned from the shopping list, guilty of carrying demonized gluten, refined sugar or ‘bad’ fat.

The documentary highlighted the scientific inconsistency of some claims that promised benefits on health, such as the vague “clean eating” trend and diet choices, such gluten-free. These labels may mislead consumers who could try promoted diets in an attempt to cure dietary disorders or, at an extreme point, illness.

The trends were promoted by “foodie” gurus and gained real and virtual popularity thanks to bloggers and social media. On Instagram alone there are more than 27 million posts with the hashtag ‘clean eating’, according to the BBC.

This tapped into the ‘food porn’ trend– GlobalData’s Q4 2015 consumer survey shows that nearly two in five global shoppers share pictures of food or drinks on social media at least once a week. Tech savvy millennials are the age-group with the highest rate of 34% sharing weekly.

This data illustrates the potential influence of online content on shopper behaviour and purchasing habits, as consumers seek the products they’ve seen online. After the BBC documentary, bloggers and online celebrities are keeping their distance from confusing tags claiming miraculous health benefits without scientific evidence, and removing nebulous words such as ‘clean’.
 
The resonance of this documentary will push manufacturers operating in the FMCG industry to adopt the same precautions in using claims and tags carrying on blurring meanings. Despite the high appeal that “on-trend” labels may have on sales, packaging, as being the privileged contact with shoppers, should skip the temptation of using “empty words,” preferring a clear communication with the final consumers based on the  nutritional value of the products.