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Menu Labeling: Coming to a Neighborhood Near You&[hellip]or is it?
Author(s) -
Green Jessie Erin,
DeWeese Robin,
Lorts Cori,
OhriVachaspati Punam
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.30.1_supplement.897.6
Subject(s) - business , geocoding , census , advertising , ethnic group , mandate , nutrition labeling , home page , marketing , geography , environmental health , computer science , world wide web , medicine , political science , the internet , population , remote sensing , law
Starting December 1, 2016, restaurants with 20 or more locations nation‐wide will be required to post calorie information on menus and menu boards. The goals of menu labeling are to increase awareness and to help patrons make healthier decisions when eating out, as consumers and nutrition professionals alike have trouble estimating the calorie content of away‐from‐home meals. The purpose of this study is to determine the proportion of restaurants that will be impacted by the new menu labeling regulations in four urban cities in New Jersey. Secondly, this study aims to determine if certain neighborhoods are more likely to be impacted by the national menu labeling mandate, based on neighborhood sociodemographics, including median household income, number of households with children under the age of 18, and race and ethnicity characteristics. Geocoded data on locations of restaurant outlets in each of the four New Jersey cities was obtained from InfoUSA and classified using a standard protocol developed for a NIH‐funded study. A list of the Top 100 Chain Restaurants from a published Technomic, Inc. report and store locater features available on restaurant webpages were used to determine menu labeling eligibility for each restaurant. In accordance with the FDA's guidelines for retail establishments, restaurants that are part of a chain with 20 or more locations, doing business under the same name, and offering substantially the same menu items were identified as menu labeling establishments, coded as 1 (vs. 0 for others). Neighborhood characteristics were obtained using census tract data from the American Community Survey. The final analysis included 1,761 restaurants located in 267 census tracts. Over 80% of restaurants were classified as a single location, meaning they will not be impacted by the new menu labeling mandate. Fifty‐one percent of included tracts have a median household income below 185% of the federal poverty line for a family of 4; the majority (greater than 50%) of residents over the age of 25 have only a high school degree or less in 69% of census tracts; 21%, 37%, and 18% of tracts are majority Hispanic, non‐Hispanic black, and non‐Hispanic white, respectively. Chi‐squared tests will be used to determine differences in the proportion of restaurants that will be impacted by menu labeling by census tract. Logistic regression models will determine the odds of being exposed to menu labeling for census tracts with different neighborhood characteristics. Results from this study can be used to determine how exposure to menu labeling may vary depending on the type of neighborhood in which an individual works or resides. Support or Funding Information Robert Wood Johnson Foundation