Could making junk food packaging plain make foods less appealing?

[DCUK NewsBot]

Plain packaging should be used for junk food and sugary drinks in a bid to discourage people from consuming unhealthy snacks, a leading expert has said. As obesity figures and type 2 diabetes rates continue to rise, much is being done to find ways to stop people from eating poorly. In 2018 a sugar tax on fizzy drinks was introduced and supersized chocolate bars and "grab bags" of sweets have since been banned from hospitals. Tom Kibasi, from the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR), is calling for sweets and drinks to be stigmatised in the way smoking has been. The smoking ban was introduced in the UK in 2007, and since then smoking rates have fallen by a third in just over 10 years. Speaking to BBC, the director of the organisation said: "Plain packaging would help us all to make better choices and reduce the hassle of pester power for busy parents." The IPPR's report, 'Ending the Blame Game: The case for a new approach to public health and prevention', has also called for junk food TV advertising to be banned before the watershed. The document also suggested cookery classes for the community should be paid for by large supermarkets and the smoking age should be increased to the age of 21. The government has said it is currently waiting to hear from England's chief medical officer, Professor Dame Sally Davies, before reviewing the idea of introducing plain packaging for sugary products. Visit Diabetes Digital Media's award-winning Low Carb Program for more information on how to cut down on junk food and enjoy real-food eating. The program contains a community of users who share recipe ideas, meal plans and tips to avoid sugar cravings.

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[kitedoc]

My guess is that yes, breaking the pattern recognition between branding, colours etc could help,
Dark brown or paleish yellow printing on the cream or bilious green or yellow back ground would put me off and i suspect many people because of its associations.
It is interesting that a lot of logos and advertising ( but not all) uses red colouring - change it and its background to the colours mentioned in the first sentence and see what happens ¡¡¡¡!!!!
Reminds of choosing colours for packaging of so-called healthy lollies to drop from a kite at kite festivals.
We attach the item say, a small fruit bar, to some crepe paper in order to slow down the fall of the ítem to prevent it hitting someone too hard. Of course the colour of the crepe adds to the spectacle but as we chose those colours we were mindful that no -one really wishes their child or themselves to pick up a brown coloured object off the sand at a beach. Apologies to those with vivid imaginations but there it is, as it were.
And if you put a warning sign in red, does that attract or repel¿

 

[jpscloud]

Might be helpful for parents, reducing pester power, but unfortunately I'd still sometimes go for junk if you wrapped it in yesterday's newspaper... oh wait, that's what we used to do with fish 'n chips! Still, yes I'd still crave and find it, as an addicted adult.

Hope for the little ones, then.

 

[Guzzler]

Robert Lustig has the right idea, stop using cartoon characters to promote sugary foods and snacks aimed at children. I remember clearly the tantrums caused by the lack of visits to MacDonalds just for the blummin' toy and the whingeing for Cocopops etc y'now brightly coloured boxed cereals that manufacturers unashamedly aim at kids.