Manufacturers and Retailers Going Healthy: A Standard Health Symbol and Proliferation into a Healthy Line.

One of the most salient trends in grocery retailing is the growing desire of consumers to buy healthier products. In response, more and more retailers and manufacturers see this growing health orientation as a way to differentiate their products, while adhering to the need for healthier consumption. This project will significantly extend the academic field on healthrelated strategies of both retailers and manufacturers by offering better insights into (i) the use of a standard health symbol and (ii) proliferation into a healthy line. A standard health symbol translates information from the Nutrition Facts panel on a product into a quickly and easily grasped health meaning (e.g. “Healthy Choice” in the Netherlands), whereas healthy lines are new product lines with clear nutritional benefits in terms of health that can be introduced by both retailers (for example, hard discounter Aldi’s “Be light” line) and manufacturers (e.g. Danone’s ‘Silhoutte fat free” line). The first study provides a deeper understanding which category and product characteristics explain the effectiveness of the addition of a standard health symbol to a product in terms of increasing the product’s sales and/or market share. A second study explores which factors drive the decision of a retailer or a national-brand manufacturer to introduce a healthy line, whereas the last study explores when healthy lines are best able to expand the mother brand share instead of cannibalizing existing sales.