An Adventure in Open Letters

Dear Graze.com,

First of all I would like to say how much I enjoy my Graze boxes.  My comments within this letter are concerned with the marketing of your products, rather than the food itself.

Initially I was bemused when I received my Pumpkin and Ginger Cake with an Afternoon Infusion. I was bemused because the Nutritional Information Leaflet told me that this box contained 75.7 kcal. It struck me as bizarre. Is it possible to be so accurate about the amount of energy contained in a unique piece of food?

Delving a little deeper, I realised that all Guilt Free High Tea products, alongside a few select others (e.g. Brilliant Black Forest - 91.3 kcal and Fruit Mango Chutney - 80.4 kcal), included calorie information to one decimal place. Not only this, but the contents of non-standardised boxes, (e.g. Pear Tatin and Apricot Torte), were measured so precisely as to be implausible, (143 kcal and 151 kcal, respectively).

As I am sure you are aware, the calories purported to be in food do not correlate with the calories absorbed by the consumer. Ambient temperature, how the food is processed, and a person’s physical state, to name a few, all affect the way nutrients are absorbed by the body. Given that all nutritional information is prone to being up to 30% more or less than the figure stated, anything other than an ‘approximation’ or ‘average’ of calories is misleading.

While I fully support your company aim to “deliver tasty, natural snacks through the post”, I am disappointed by the use of ‘dieting’ language in descriptions of your products. Encouragement of calorie counting is one such example. This seems at odds with your ethos - if it were natural to count calories, surely fruit would grow with this information printed on the skin? Humans survived for hundreds of thousands of years without knowing such details. In this way, the following quote contradicts your ‘natural’ viewpoint,

“All our lowest calorie nibbles. Everything’s between 50 and 150 calories and nothing tastes like diet food. Great if you’re watching your weight.”

Weight almost always takes care of itself when eating a varied diet – its mention here prays more on insecurities about the cosmetic aspects of weight gain. Unfortunately, obsession over calories is not the only example of 'dieting' language present on your website.

On ‘The 80/20 Rule’ page, you state,

“Be good 80% of the time and treat yourself the other 20% of the time.”

This appears at odds with the Graze idea that healthy foods can be treats, and that treats can be healthy. I also take issue with the premise of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ food. Food, by its definition, is either nutritious - or it is not food. We need fats, sugar and salt as well as fruit, veg and fibre. In fact, the ‘Variety, You’re My Hero’ page succinctly relays this.

Vilification of food is a common theme within the diet industry, and I did not have to search for long to find more examples on the Graze.com website.

“It really is amazing the difference you can make to your diet just by swapping something naughty for one of our nutritious nibbles. It’s a heroic double effect giving you healthy benefits (every graze snack has at least one) and the big bonus of avoiding snacks that are a lot more evil.”

I appreciate that the use of the world ‘evil’ here was probably flippant, but that does not excuse the characterisation of those who consume ‘naughty’ nibbles. I suspect that painting certain nutrients as ‘forbidden’ merely makes us desire them more. Worse than this, however, is the implication that your customers should feel ashamed for eating food that is not produced by Graze.

“Guilt-free High Tea”

“Just how guilt-free is my cake? They're so light, we even include them in our lightbox.”

“This means that all our little puds are under 140 calories so you get just enough to remind you of your old favourites (without feeling guilty afterwards).”

“We love brownies but we wanted one that didn’t make us feel rubbish afterwards.”

Graze presents itself as being friendly, and uses a conversational tone in all communications, which makes the emotional language here feel manipulative. It is not unreasonable to expect a food company to speak positively about eating. Brands such as ‘Eat Natural’ manage to market wholesome snacks without pandering to the weight-obsessed philosophy of the diet industry.

Of course Graze is not unique in any of the aforementioned factors. The reason I am writing is because I feel the brand has a chance to stand out from the majority of self-proclaimed ‘healthy’ products - by also encouraging a healthy attitude.

I look forward to hearing your response.

Yours faithfully,

BT