Research report Consumer appeal of nutrition and health claims in three existing product concepts Wim Verbeke a, *, Joachim Scholderer b , Liisa La ¨ hteenma ¨ki b a Department of Agricultural Economics, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, 9000 Gent, Belgium b MAPP, Aarhus University, Haslegaardsvej 10, 8210 Aarhus V, Denmark Introduction Consumer research related to foods that claim specific health benefits has concentrated during the last decade on profiling consumers who accept the concept of so-called functional foods in terms of their socio-demographics (Childs, 1997; Gilbert, 2000; Poulsen, 1999; Verbeke, 2005), attitudinal profiles and motivations to use functional foods (Bech-Larsen & Grunert, 2003; Landstro ¨ m, Koivisto Hursti, Becker, & Magnusson, 2007; Niva, 2007; Urala & La ¨ hteenma ¨ ki, 2003, 2007), and studies investigating consumer reactions towards different types of health claims (Behrens, Villanueva, & da Silva, 2007; Urala, Arvola, & La ¨ hteenmaa ¨ki, 2003; van Kleef, van Trijp, & Luning, 2005; van Trijp & van der Lans, 2007). Whereas the earlier studies focused rather on the concept of functional or enriched foods in general, more recent studies have paid attention to specific product categories and concrete types of products. Also in the health claim consumer studies, attention is increasingly paid to concrete carrier products, in combination with diverse claim formats. The present study is in line with the two latest developments in the focus of consumer studies in the area of functional foods, through focussing on specific product categories, and on consumers’ reactions to a diversity of nutrition and health claims in combination with specific and existing carrier products. Beyond providing consumer protection against unsubstan- tiated or untruthful statements about foods, nutrition and health claims can help consumers to make better-informed food choices (Leathwood, Richardson, Stra ¨ ter, Todd, & van Trijp, 2007; Williams & Ghosh, 2008). At the same time, nutrition and health claims are strong marketing incentives for the food industry (Bech-Larsen & Scholderer, 2007; Cheftel, 2005), providing opportunities for product differentiation based on a health-related positioning. Within the European Union, Regulation EC (No) 1924/2006 (European Commission, 2007) from January 2007 allows basically two types of claims to be made on foodstuffs: nutrition claims and health claims. The latter can be divided into functional health claims (further in this paper called just ‘‘health claims’’) and reduction of disease risk claims. The regulatory system is the strictest with respect to reduction of disease risk claims, which have been classified as a specific category under health claims. This reflects the concern that the reduction of disease risk type of claims are expected to have a stronger potential of misleading consumers if they are not scientifically substantiated. Bech-Larsen and Scholderer (2007) expressed scepticism towards the potential for the new legislation to enlarge the European market for functional foods because of the lack of correspondence between Appetite 52 (2009) 684–692 ARTICLE INFO Article history: Received 4 December 2008 Received in revised form 10 March 2009 Accepted 18 March 2009 Keywords: Functional foods Nutrition and health claims Consumer Omega-3 Breakfast cereals Fruit juice ABSTRACT This paper reports on consumers’ reactions towards calcium-enriched fruit juice, omega-3 enriched spread and fibre-enriched cereals, each with a nutrition claim, health claim and reduction of disease risk claim. Cross-sectional data were collected in April 2006 from a sample of 341 consumers in Belgium. Consumers’ reactions to the carrier product, functional ingredient and claim combinations were assessed as perceived convincingness of the claim, credibility of the product, attractiveness of the product, and intention to buy the product, while accounting for differences in product familiarity, attitudinal and demographic characteristics. Generally, health claims outperformed nutrition claims, and both of these claim types outperformed reduction of disease risk claims. Comparing consumer reactions across product concepts revealed clear preferences for fibre-enriched cereals as compared to the other two concepts. The interaction effects between claim type and product concept indicated that reduction of disease risk claims are perceived very well in omega-3 enriched spreads, particularly in terms of perceived convincingness of the claim, while not appealing to consumers in the other product concepts. Positive attitudes towards functional foods and familiarity with the concrete functional product category boosted the claim type and product ratings, whereas perceived control over own health and perceiving functional foods as a marketing scam decreased all product concept’s appeal. ß 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: wim.verbeke@UGent.be (W. Verbeke), sch@asb.dk (J. Scholderer), liisal@asb.dk (L. La ¨ hteenma ¨ ki). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Appetite journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/appet 0195-6663/$ – see front matter ß 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.appet.2009.03.007