Vegan labels can make people think the food won’t taste good, study says

More and more food producers are slapping ‘vegan’ labels on their products to entice a new generation of ethical eaters.

But a new study suggests these labels can have a negative effect how the food is perceived by consumers. 

Researchers in Germany investigated product perceptions and consumer purchasing intentions around vegan labelling on products. 

They found that people expected certain products to taste worse when they saw they had a vegan label – probably on the basis that they knew it didn’t contain milk, butter and other tasty animal fats. 

The study focused on ‘randomly-vegan products’ – food products that are vegan by default, rather than being formulated specifically for the vegan market. 

An example is Nestle’s Shreddies, which added a prominent green vegan…