The George Institute for Global Health, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
School of Rural Medicine, Faulty of Medicine and Health, University of New England, Armidale, Australia.
BMC Med. 2024 Aug 26;22(1):341. doi: 10.1186/s12916-024-03557-y.
Prominent product placement is a core promotional tactic in retail food environments. How this practice has been adapted for online supermarkets, and the extent to which it is applied to healthier and less healthy food products in this setting, is largely unknown. We aimed to investigate placement-type promotions of food products in Australian online supermarkets.
We developed a new method to assess placement promotions and applied it to the online stores of the two largest supermarket retailers in Australia. Each online store was audited across six 'locations' (input prior to data collection), including a randomly selected high socio-economic position area and low socio-economic position area from each of the three largest Australian cities. The names, page locations and type of placement strategy of promoted food products were captured, with product healthiness assessed using the Health Star Rating (HSR) nutrient profiling system. Descriptive statistics summarised the page locations of promoted products and the placement strategies used to promote them, and chi-squared tests applied to compare product healthiness by retailer and socio-economic position.
We recorded 12,152 food products promoted through placement strategies, 99% of which were eligible for a HSR. Overall, 44% of products promoted through placement strategies were unhealthy. Cross-promotions and recommendations was the most common strategy recorded overall (55.9% of all strategies), and advertisements and site content was the strategy most likely to promote unhealthy products (53.7% of products unhealthy). One retailer was more likely to promote unhealthy products (46% v 43%, p = 0.004) and unhealthy products were more likely to be promoted in more disadvantaged than less disadvantaged locations (45% vs 43%, p = 0.05), though the magnitudes of difference were small.
A considerable number of unhealthy products are likely presented to online grocery shoppers in Australia. Public health policies targeting unhealthy food promotions may need to be updated, including with consideration of the different ways that products can be prominently displayed online, to avoid exacerbating risks of diet-related disease and health inequalities. Our novel methodology could be used for ongoing monitoring of online supermarkets in Australia and elsewhere to inform such policies.
突出的产品植入是零售食品环境中的核心促销策略。这种做法在在线超市中是如何适应的，以及在这种环境下它在更健康和不太健康的食品产品上的应用程度，在很大程度上是未知的。我们旨在调查澳大利亚在线超市中食品产品的植入式促销类型。
我们开发了一种新的方法来评估植入式促销，并将其应用于澳大利亚两家最大的超市零售商的在线商店。每个在线商店都在六个“位置”（在数据收集之前进行输入）进行了审核，包括从澳大利亚三个最大城市中的每个城市随机选择的高社会经济地位区域和低社会经济地位区域。记录了促销食品产品的名称、页面位置和植入式策略类型，使用健康星级评级（HSR）营养分析系统评估产品的健康度。描述性统计数据总结了促销产品的页面位置和用于促销的植入式策略，并应用卡方检验比较零售商和社会经济地位的产品健康度。
我们记录了通过植入式策略促销的 12152 种食品产品，其中 99%有资格获得 HSR。总体而言，通过植入式策略促销的产品中有 44%是不健康的。交叉促销和推荐是总体上记录到的最常见策略（所有策略的 55.9%），而广告和网站内容是最有可能促销不健康产品的策略（不健康产品的 53.7%）。一家零售商更有可能促销不健康产品（46%比 43%，p=0.004），而且在较不利的地区比在较有利的地区更有可能促销不健康产品（45%比 43%，p=0.05），尽管差异幅度很小。
澳大利亚的在线杂货购物者很可能会看到大量不健康的产品。针对不健康食品促销的公共卫生政策可能需要更新，包括考虑产品在线突出显示的不同方式，以避免加剧与饮食相关的疾病和健康不平等的风险。我们的新方法可以用于澳大利亚和其他地方的在线超市的持续监测，为这些政策提供信息。
