A new study out of Ohio State University supports a push for restaurants to begin providing caloric information on the dishes they serve.

The study collected data about choices consumers made among 12 entrees offered at a university dining center that operates much like a fast-food restaurant. Researchers found that when nutrition information was provided at the point-of-purchase, sales of high-calorie entrees dramatically decreased, while sales of lower-calorie items substantially increased. After the nutrition information was removed, sales of the higher-calorie items gradually increased again.

The study offers strong evidence for requiring restaurants to provide nutrition information in a manner that doesn’t require consumers to ask for it or look for it, said Gail Kaye, one of the study’s authors. Significantly, the restaurant lost nothing in sales during the study, Kaye said. The revenue per entree sold remained consistent before, during and after the nutrition information was offered. This finding could help reduce qualms of restaurants hesitant to offer calorie information to consumers for fear that sales would decrease, but Kaye, a program director with Ohio State University Extension and the Department of Human Nutrition in the College of Education and Human Ecology, is even more interested in the calorie savings for consumers.

Source: USAgNet.com

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