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Does promoting protein content push up plant-based sales?

Promoting the protein content of meat-free products is a more effective sales strategy than adding carbon labels, a study of UK bakery chain Greggs suggests.

The British chain could more than double sales of its meat-free products by centring the marketing of its vegan sausage roll on protein content rather than sustainability credentials, the research study, examining interventions to lower meat consumption, found.

Protein labelling outperformed both the control group and the carbon labelling group, with an increase in uptake “of more than 100%”, the researchers wrote.

“[Greggs] have a unique opportunity to not only increase sales but also cement themselves as leaders in sustainability,” Dr Chris Macdonald, director of the Better Protein Institute research company and fellow at the University of Cambridge, told Ingredients Network. “The ball is in their court now.”

The Better Protein Institute, which is headed by Macdonald, has shared the study results with Greggs and offered to collaborate to hone its sales and marketing strategy.

The psychology behind plant-based purchases

Macdonald was inspired to carry out the research after seeing that emissions displays for food show modest, mixed results – “perhaps unsurprisingly, given they are difficult to interpret without additional context”, he said.

Meal choice settings can make consumers feel time pressured, thereby decreasing the efficacy of an intervention when it presents novel and complex information. Settings with a wide range of food options can also cause consumers to seek less information via cognitive shortcuts.

Furthermore, calculating product-specific emissions data and displaying it poses multiple technical challenges. Consumers want easy-to-access and digestible information, and companies want to convey this in the most effective way possible to connect with shoppers and maximise sales.

Moving away from the ‘environmental bias’

“Given its impracticality, limited efficacy, and that it goes against much of what decades-old consumer psychology literature tells us, why is carbon labelling such a popular intervention?” asked Macdonald.

The answer is, in part, due to an “environmentalist bias”, he argued.

The false consensus effect is the tendency for people to overestimate the prevalence of their own beliefs and values, believing them to be more common than they really are.

“Researchers who are also environmentalists might tend towards interventions that highlight negative environmental impacts because it is what influences them, and they may assume that it will be equally persuasive to the average consumer,” said Macdonald.

With this awareness, manufacturers have the opportunity to take alternative actions that focus on aspects other than sustainability to promote meat-free food.

Picking protein to push plant-based sales

The findings drew on prior engagement with consumers, which Macdonald stated often present an anomaly in behavioural economics, particularly in sustainable food choice research.

The study interviewed thousands of consumers and found that a common barrier emerged: the belief that it is not possible to consume sufficient protein without eating meat.

However, awareness and uptake surrounding the nutritional benefits of a meat-free diet are more prominent in today’s food sector. Today’s alternative protein market offers various low-cost, high-protein meat-free ingredients for manufacturers to choose from, and many elite athletes – including professional bodybuilders and Olympic gold medallists – follow a meat-free lifestyle.

“I call this perceived barrier the ‘insufficiency illusion’,” said Macdonald.

The research explored the idea that simple protein labelling has previously helped to dismantle this perceived barrier and had the potential to outperform carbon labelling.

Macdonald thought that an indirect (also known as a “nudge-by-proxy”) approach may be more effective at reducing emissions.

“The results were shocking: protein content labels doubled the chances of picking meat-free meals,” he said.

“A rising tide of global meat consumption fuels an increasingly dangerous narrative: that changing consumption habits is simply too difficult. My work provides a defiant counternarrative.”

Applying a data-driven approach, the Better Protein Institute aims to uncover new approaches that significantly outperform popular interventions.

“The secret is simple: returning to first principles, engaging with the consumer, and not acquiescing to external pessimism,” Macdonald added.