Shouldn't Natural Foods Actually be Natural?

[SecularMotion]

Years ago the delightfully-naughty movie star, Mae West, said: "I used to be Snow White, but I drifted."

Less delightful are some of the purity claims of such food manufacturing giants as PepsiCo, which has long marketed a line of its Frito-Lay snack foods as "Simply Natural." Natural? Anyone who's even looked at one of the company's strangely-puffed, caterpillaresque, cheese-powdered, "Cheetos" would have a hard time believing nature had anything to do with the concoctions. Sure enough, PepsiCo has quietly dropped the volatile "natural" claim from its snack packages, rebranding them with just the word "Simply."

The multibillion-dollar food maker says the shift is merely a routine adjustment of its marketing scheme – but it comes only after consumer groups have taken Pepsi, Campbell Soup, and other manufactures to court in the past couple of years, successfully challenging their use of the "natural" phrase as deceptive hype.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/02/16-1

[Agnosticsherbet]

1. The "natural" in "natural foods" has no legal definition.

So when seen on labeling, it has no specific meaning. Organic, on the other hand, is defined by law and does mean something. For instance, a food labeled Organic can have no more than 8% GMO food in a product. It can not be grown closer to a GMO crop than 100 feet. It can not used chemical fertilizers or pesticides.

[longship]

2. "Natural" is a meaningless marketing term.

Anybody who claims otherwise has been hoodwinked, or is a marketer.

[Liberal_in_LA]

3. yes, but processed food companies coopted the term, now it's used to make people feel better

About the junk food they are eating

[HuckleB]

4. Food terminology is now nothing but a bad marketing joke.

What's bizarre, is how many people buy into it, almost religiously.