WASHINGTON – A coalition including NACS, the Food Marketing
Institute (FMI), pizzerias and state associations sent a letter to Capitol Hill
yesterday asking members of Congress to support H.R. 1249, the Common Sense
Nutrition Disclosure Act.
Draft regulations to enact nutritional labeling requirements
would impose unreasonable burdens on many businesses, particularly convenience
stores. H.R. 1249 would ensure that the final regulations set reasonable
standards and treat businesses according to their primary business activities.
“Our businesses currently provide substantive, useful
nutrition information. More than 95% of the items sold in grocery and
convenience stores already provide nutrition information, and food retailers
are adopting more user-friendly guidance on the front of food packages and
shelf-tags,” says the letter. “In addition, our operations strive to meet consumers’
nutritional interests with more choices and better nutritional information for
the foods that we sell.”
NACS has argued that any menu-labeling regulations must
account for differences between the convenience store business model and a
chain restaurant business model. The proposed regulations are tailored to the
restaurant business model, and unless they are revised to reflect our industry,
they should not apply to convenience stores. In comments to FDA, NACS
recommended to the FDA that a floor space calculation should be replaced with
one based on revenues.
NACS believes that revenue — not floor space — is how the
government should measure a business’s primary activity and that floor space is
an ambiguous standard prone to manipulation. Also, prepackaged food — which
already contains nutritional information — should not be a part of this
equation. Instead, the FDA should be looking only at food that is prepared
on-site and intended for immediate consumption.
H.R. 1249, introduced by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers
(R-WA), would apply menu-labeling provisions to locations where 50% or more of
a store’s revenues are from food that is: (a) intended for immediate
consumption, or (b) prepared and processed on-site. Prepackaged food would not
be considered in this solution. FDA would therefore be able to meet its goals
of menu labeling under law without adding unnecessary costs to convenience stores.
Ask your representative to support H.R. 1249 today.