Diet-conscious beer drinkers can claim ignorance no more
DETROIT — Beer drinkers can’t claim blissful ignorance for much longer.
Starting next month, packages of Bud Light will have prominent labels showing the beer’s calories and ingredients as well as the amount of fat, carbohydrates and protein in a serving.
Bud Light is likely the first of many to make the move. The labels aren’t legally required, but major beer makers agreed in 2016 to voluntarily disclose nutrition facts on their products by 2020.
Many brands, including Corona Light, Guinness, Heineken and Coors Light, already have calories and other nutrition information on their bottles or packaging. But it’s in small type, or hidden on the bottom of the six-pack, and ingredients aren’t listed.
Bud Light went with a big, blackand-white label, similar to the ones required by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on packaged foods. At the top, Bud Light lists its four ingredients: water, barley, rice and hops. Below that, it shows the calories in a 12-ounce bottle or can (110) and other facts.
“We want to be transparent and give people the thing they are used to seeing,” said Andy Goeler, vice president of marketing for Bud Light.
Individual bottles and cans of Bud Light won’t have the full labels, but they’ll continue to have some nutrition information printed in small type.
Goeler said the brand’s research shows younger drinkers, in particular, want to know what’s in their beer.
“They have grown up really in tune to ingredients,” he said.
But the question is: Will such labels make a difference in the choices consumers make? At least one study suggests they won’t.
Researchers at Cornell University and Louisiana State University tracked what happened when diners were given menus with calorie counts. It found that diners who knew the calorie counts ordered lower-calorie appetizers and entrees, but the calorie counts had little impact on orders for drinks.