Foodwatch clashes with supermarkets over ‘juice’

A drink, from a legal standpoint, is only fruit juice if it consists of 100% fruit juice, with nothing added. Fruit drinks that consist only partly of juice are therefore not allowed to be called ‘juice’. Yet, in their online shops, supermarkets use the term ‘juice’ for the general category of fruit drinks. Is that allowed? Foodwatch submitted three complaints about this to the Dutch Advertising Code Committee (RCC), aimed at the online shops of Jumbo, Plus and Albert Heijn. But Foodwatch failed to convince the RCC Chairman: the legislation for the term ‘juice’ does not apply to the categorisation of retail shelves, whether physical or digital. The strict requirement for the name ‘juice’ therefore does not apply in this context. The Chairman also found that this is not misleading. The consumer will not think that products under categories such as ‘juice’ and ‘non-chilled juice’ meet the legal definition of ‘fruit juice’. If the consumer is not yet familiar with the product, he or she can read the detailed product description to find out what it contains.

The ruling is very flexible. The legal text in itself does not provide a definite answer. Based on the literal text of the law the ruling could therefore have gone the other way as well. The Chairman finds it more important for the consumer to be able to navigate easily through the online shop, by means of short and simple, recognisable product categories. As a result it is less important for those categories to cover the (legal) load exactly.

NB: the placement of different products on a particular product shelf may well be legally relevant. Especially in the context of health items and medicines it seems logical for the manner of display to be strictly monitored. For example, if an herbal preparation is placed on the “painkillers” shelf, the product will possibly be classified as a medicine from a legal standpoint. Conclusion: it is important to view the decision of the RCC Chairman in its specific context. These are normal foods in a regular (online) supermarket.

Bram Duivenvoorde