Changes are coming to your favorite breakfast cereals! According to New York Magazine…
“General Mills announced that it will be the first major cereal-maker to ditch artificial colors and flavors from the 40 percent of its products that still have them. It’s going to sub in fruit- and vegetable-juice concentrates in Trix, Cocoa Puffs, and Reese’s Puffs, and hopes to have reformulated versions of 90 percent of its cereals on shelves by the end of 2016. The company joins fast- and packaged-food brands like Panera, Subway, Taco Bell, Nestlé, and Kraft, in what Grub Street deemed “the great artificial-ingredient purge of 2015.” (Chipotle‘s ban on genetically modified ingredients notwithstanding).
While some groups suggest that dyes like yellow 6 and red 40 arecarcinogenic, General Mills says the changes are not in response to health concerns, but rather consumers’ increasing interest in ingredients. Jim Murphy, president of the company’s cereal division, told the MinneapolisStar Tribune that the move would help its business at a time when the cereal industry has seen sales shrink by 5 percent over the last five years. Industry analysts say that while older generations were concerned withnutritional stats like calories and fat, younger people care more about qualities like “local,” ”organic,” and “natural.” And it seems that large food companies are doing the bare minimum to keep buyers around. To wit, the Washington Post reports that there will be “minimal to no changes in nutrition” in the General Mills cereals.”