With the FDA still fiddling with rule changes that require chain restaurants to post calorie information for the products on their in-store menu, the country’s largest pizza chains have stopped fighting each other and banded together to fight federal regulators.
The American Pizza Community — which sounds like it could be the name of a really awesome prog-rock band — is a joint creation of Domino’s, Papa John’s, Little Caesars, Pizza Hut and others. It formed in January to make the argument to the folks in Washington that the world of pizza is too expansive to fit into the strict requirements of the menu boards.
The group argues that since pizzas generally come in multiple sizes and with a wide variety of toppings, it would require menu boards that would be larger than the menu.
The FDA proposal does allow restaurants to provide a calorie range for customizable items, but there could be a calorie swing of more than a thousand calories for people who load up on extra cheese and meats.
The Pizza Community also takes issue with the FDA requirement to list calories for an entire pie. According to the group, people only eat around 2.1 slices on average.
Reiterating arguments made last year by Domino’s CEO J. Patrick Doyle, the crust coalition claims that 90% of its orders are placed online or over the phone, meaning an overwhelming majority of customers would never even see the menu boards.
A D.C.-area Domino’s franchisee tells the Washington Post that she has had menu boards up in 10 of her Maryland stores and discerned no change in buying habits.
“I don’t see pizza counts dropping, and I don’t see salads running out the door,” she tells the Washington Post.
A rep for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, which has supported many menu labeling initiatives, tells the Post that there is nothing special about the pizza business.
“We heard the same types of arguments from the whole restaurant industry when they were opposing menu labeling in the early days,” she explains. “I don’t know what’s up with the pizza industry.”
Pizza chains band together over proposed menu-labeling plan [Washington Post]
More From Consumerist
-
NYC Restaurant Selling $1K Pizza With Six Kinds Of Caviar On It
-
FDA Says Writing Menu Labeling Regulations That Please Everyone Is A Tough Task
-
McDonald's Menu Boards To Reveal How Many Calories Are Going Along For The Ride With That Big Mac
-
McDonald’s Pushing Its Healthier Items On Menus Just In Time For The Olympics
-
We’re All Basically Clueless When It Comes To How Many Calories Are In Fast Food
I would assume they could list calorie count ranges for standard offerings only.
They could also break it down into components and match that to pizza sizes and have a nice grid. The result would allow an interested party to see that adding pepperoni to the medium pizza also ads 70 calories a slice.
Non problem solved.
Except that you can get pizza’s sliced differently now … regular cut or square cut? and how much is a serving?
Do calories by the slice:
Large pizza: 200 cal per slice
medium: 150 cal per slice
small: 100 cal per slice
square cut: 50 per slice
then by topping per slice, so (depending on how many sizes) 4 counts per topping.
That would actually take up a lot of space
Do calories by the slice:
Large pizza: 200 cal per slice
medium: 150 cal per slice
small: 100 cal per slice
square cut: 50 per slice
then by topping per slice, so (depending on how many sizes) 4 counts per topping.
That would actually take up a lot of space
“the country’s largest pizza chains have stopped fighting each other and banded together to fight federal regulators”
I smell another too big to fail industry.
That picture made me know what I’m craving for lunch today…
2.1 slices.. that’s all…I’ll eat 2 at Costcos unless we get a whole pie and then it’s 2.5 – 3 and at the Pizza Hut lunch buffet it’s at least 10 of those mini-slices
2 slices is just a warm up. Like those couple of drinks you have before heading out.
“According to the group, people only eat around 2.1 slices on average.” Really? Who are these people? Models? The lactose intolerant?
I thought half a pie was the standard serving size.
i only eat 2 slices and i’m normal sized! I eat frequently though, every 2-3 hours.
Does this average include children too? I average 3 + a bottle of Sriracha.
I only eat two slices, but then again, I always ask them to cut the pie into quarters.
I only eat two pieces, but I don’t have them slice the pizzas at all.
Of course, this was back in the day when Little Caesar’s sold a long paper-wrapped cardboard tray with 2 full-sized pizzas side by side. (and crazy bread *drools*)
The saying goes, “any pizza pie is a personal pizza if you believe in yourself”
LMAO!
Never heard that one before.
I would say that the people that only eat 2 slices are the ones that actually read labels. On the other hand, I don’t think there are nearly enough of those kind of people to account for that average.
Pizza is energy dense. It’s not so much unhealthy on it’s own but there’s certainly are unhealthy expectations regarding portion sizes.
Although people might lie on surveys to avoid looking like a gluttonous pig.
I pretty much only eat 2 slices. When I eat 3, I wish I hadn’t because I am often too full after that. This means a pizza lasts my husband and I two meals.
If there is meat on the pizza, I only eat one slice.
I can only eat 1-2 of the standard crust. I eat about 4 of the thin crust ones, +1 if I’m hungry. I just don’t like to eat beyond comfortably full.
Then again, I’m a size 2P, so I don’t have huge tummy capacity.
What does Pizza Hut, Little Ceasars, Dominos or Pappa Johns have to do with real pizza? Many people do not consider the concoctions these people peddle to be pizza.
Don’t care if it’s “real” pizza… still tastes delicious.
Bravo, you eat at local mom and pop pizza shops. Thanks for pointing that out to the rest of us, let us bask in your foodie superiority.
Obviously plenty of people consider what these chains sell to be pizza, since they are all over the goddamn country and have managed to stay in and grow their business for decades. But don’t let that stop you from thumbing your nose at everyone else.
You’re confusing a convenient, easy to find, pizza-shaped object with actual pizza. Kind of like people confusing what McDonald’s sells with actual hamburgers. They’re both cheap and convenient, so they sell well. But that doesn’t make them real food.
+5 foodie points for you too.
It is food. Of course its not particularly good, all natural or nutritious doesn’t mean it’s not food. Obviously a local restaurant’s hamburger is better than a Big Mac, a sandwich you make at home is better than Quizno’s or my mothers lasagna is better than anything served at Olive Garden, but this elitist ideology of “big chains don’t serve authentic/and or unprocessed pizza/burgers/chinese food/etc” is getting old. It’s great that you choose to frequent local restaurants or even better, make everything from scratch at home. Fantastic. But here is a news flash: unless you grew or butchered whatever it is you eat, then you better believe it’s just as processed and pumped up with shit as the cardboard they serve you at Domino’s.
It’s pizza-type food. Nothing fresh, nothing homemade, nothing processed down to the cheapest cost per gram of ingredients. No foodie snobbery, just working tastebuds.
No, actually it is pizza.
Try pizza in some tourist trap in Italy. It will give you a whole new appreciation for American pizza chains.
Pizza isn’t Italian food. It’s American food made out of semi-Italian ingredients. I would not expect to find good pizza in Italy.
Eh, what? Go on a trip to Italy and have some pizza there. Then come back and report to us. I am very sure you’ll change your mind about this. Btw, pizza was “invented” in Greece a very long time ago.
“Reiterating arguments made last year by Domino’s CEO J. Patrick Doyle, the crust coalition claims that 90% of its orders are placed online or over the phone, meaning an overwhelming majority of customers would never even see the menu boards.
A D.C.-area Domino’s franchisee tells the Washington Post that she has had menu boards up in 10 of her Maryland stores and discerned no change in buying habits.”
If that is the case, why oppose the regulation? It will almost certainly cost more to oppose it than to simply put up a board on the wall of the take-out place.
Where does the Federal Government get the Constitutional authority to regulate food menus?
Please cite the relevant Article and Section, and please note Article 1 Section 8 Clause 3 only applies to interstate commerce.
When I buy pizza these days, I typically don’t interact with my local franchise. I interact directly with the mother ship. THAT is most certainly an inter state transaction.
Making rules about actual menus in stores? That’s a bit quaint really.
Although if you have the ingredient information already, creating a suitable ingredient matrix and printing it is pretty trivial. Give the job to a summer intern. You will spend far less than trying to fight it.
If anything, this is to prevent wider awareness of how much nutritional impact there is in a single slice of pizza. People might realize what gluttonous pigs they are and ease up a little.
The Corporate Food Machine can’t have people making sensible healthy choices.
> When I buy pizza these days, I typically don’t interact with my local franchise. I interact directly with the mother ship. THAT is most certainly an inter state transaction.
Thanks for conclusively proving my point.
The term “chain restaurants” kind of nullifies your entire argument.
There is very clear interstate commerce occurring in that case. The pizza establishment in question is quite certainly incorporated in some other state.
The web just makes it more obvious.
> There is very clear interstate commerce occurring in that case.
Fabricated nonsense.
> The pizza establishment in question is quite certainly incorporated in some other state.
Irrelevant.
Ordering a pizza is not “commerce among the several states.”
Exactly. As with marketing junk food to children, I’ll never understand why some people are enthusiastic about promoting corporations’ rights to tax breaks, “free speech,” selective disclosure, and any other hands-off policies while proportionally eager to blame individual consumers about their educational deficiencies and poor choices. It’s a perfect example of victim blaming.
Because they’re so privileged by being white/male/educated/salaried (or aspiring to do so) and convinced that government controls/minorities/illegal immigrants are the only barrier to their success. So, they get to be the victim and get an external excuse as to why they’re not as successful as they want to be.
That’s a cop-out. Granted, it’s an old cop-out, and generally well entrenched, but it’s still a cop-out. Congress’ regulatory power over interstate commerce was to prevent individual states from enacting legislation that harmed others when it came to inter-state and international trading. Claiming Commerce Clause when the customer and the location are both local, and nothing is being shipped interstate is disingenuous. This sort of legislation should rightly be done by a sort of “UCC for food”, where states all agree to uphold a common standard.
Spare me these “strict constitutionalists” who have been fed the idea (because they can’t think for themselves) that every single law in this country must be spelled out in the Constitution.
We’ve been a nation now for more than two centuries. Laws get passed by Congress. The executive branch exercises its authority. The courts make rulings.
And yes, all of THAT is spelled out in the Constitution.
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
– Ninth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
– Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States
Those two amendments together, combined with Article VI Section 2 mean that yes, every law must be spelled out in the Constitution. Nobody is being “fed” the idea. It’s right there in the text of the document.
By the way, the term you are looking for is “strict constructionist.” If you’re going to label someone, at least try to be accurate.
I take it you are a person who believes the Federal Government should have unlimited power to do as it pleases, including dictating to a local restaurant how to write its menu.
The Constitution enumerates the powers of the Federal Government. In other words, it says “Congress may do A, B or C.” Please offer support for your assertion the Constitution actually means “Congress may do A, B, or C or anything it wants.”
Careful, now. An inaccurate label isn’t going to qualify as an answer.
“Old dudes from 200+ years ago have all the answers, their will must be satisfied lest they descend from the heavens and strike us down.”
Thanks for clarifying your opposition to the Constitution.
1 – See “amendments.” it’s clear that adjustments need to be made as time goes on.
2 – You should ask why you adhere to a multi-centuries old document and don’t feel that adjustments or changes are necessary or natural.
It is CLEARLY interstate commerce since these companies ALL have units throughout multiple states.. In fact, the law only applies to those companies that have over a specified number of units. This means your mom and pop will not be subject to the labeling.
It also comes from GENERAL WELFARE clause, which also gives power to things like the FDA, USDA, the FCC, the FAA. Of course, I am guessing as a proper libertarian you must be totally against the drug war anything else that is not specified in a document written in the 1700′s when the people who wrote it were all heterosexual white males.
Rampaging pack of straw men waving handfuls of upper case letters sweep across discussion. Thousands confused. Film at 11.
Do you believe the spirit of the law? Because the spirit of the law is to inform the customer, nothing wrong with that. However, if the vast majority of their customers are not ordering in person it makes little sense for a business to have to conform to this law because you are not achieving the stated goal of the law.
There should be exceptions for any business that has XX% or less of it’s business in person. Heck for good will this Pizza coalition could say “we’ll print personalized calorie counts on every box” that would cost the companies a fraction of the price of menu boards and actually achieve the purpose of the law.
1 large pepperoni pan pizza – 10000 cal.
1 large saussage and onion hand tossed pizza – 15000 cal.
I can see why they wouldn’t want to put those labels up.
Pretty much. Luigi doesn’t like pizza. Mario does. Coincidence?
> 1 large pepperoni pan pizza – 10000 cal
BULLshit
Every slice is like a piece of bread, an ounce of cheese, and an ounce of meat.
That’s a conservative estimate. It’s probably more in practice.
Now multiply that times 6 or 8.
The result is not trivial. Your local pusher doesn’t want you to realize this.
From the Pizza Hut website:
Large Pepperoni Pan Pizza: 1 slice = 380 calories * 8 slices per = 3040 calories
I can see why they wouldn’t want to post calorie info, whether it’s by the slice or by the pizza….
It’s not like it would be possible to create a matrix with a row representing each topping and a column representing each pizza size. THAT WOULD NOT BE POSSIBLE. MATRICES ARE TIME CONSUMING AND CONFUSING.
Damn Coffee, you spelled the plural of matrix correctly. Bully for you.
I would take pride in the fact, but matrices have been an obsession of mine since they killed my father.
Coffee, yours is a strong story, simply told. You have written an eloquent and powerful narrative as a young witness to the matrices atrocities against your father and you have the courage and determination that will enable you to survive and be an eloquent voice for peace and justice as you put your thoughts and experiences down on paper.
Yeah. Matrices are douches. LOL!
Matrices raped my mother!
It’s really going to suck when you find out…
…YOUR FATHER IS A MATRIX.
I know, right?
TOPPINGS
Pepperoni Sausage Ex. Cheese Peppers Meat Supreme
Small: 100 Cal +150 +123 +100 +75 +200
Med: 150 Cal +175 +X +X +X +X
Large: 200 Cal +220
You get the idea. Simple.
Pizza hut already has a matrix on their site (I used it to see if the calorie counts you listed were even close, they are not).
Center for Junk Science in the Interest of our little group of Nanny Statists
It isn’t like the numbers aren’t already available.
Calorie counts and the effects of calorie intake on the human body is junk science?
In a way, I kind of support the big pizza chains on this. Every pizza slice is different from the next. When you add deep dish, thin crust, or a crazy variety of toppings, the list could go on. If this was required to be visible on an order menu, you would need reading glasses.
Pizza Hut I believe has nutritional info on their website and it’s like reading a book for all the different types of varieties, sizes, toppings and servings. Although more information is helpful, I doubt most of us are counting calories when we order off the menu at Pizza Hut, Papa Johns, McDonalds or Wendy’s.
I don’t know why everyone thinks this. Yes, if I’ve gone to a pizza joint I have resigned myself to eating less healthy than somewhere else, BUT I always use these lists to compare items against others at the same store.
If I was torn between getting 2 different gourmet slices and discovered one is half the calories of the other, it would be extremely helpful to my descision process.
“I don’t see pizza counts dropping, and I don’t see salads running out the door,”
Ignorant statement. People aren’t going to buy a salad in a pizza joint because they looked at the calorie count. What they’ll do is modify the toppings or type of crust that they buy.
Not only that, most pizza joints aren’t very good at making salads, and worse at making them without drowning them in dressing that neatly negates any benefit.
>>What they’ll do is modify the toppings or type of crust that they buy.
Would they? Do most people modify their pizza desires based on calorie count?
My family expects a coupe of pepperoni, mushroom, and ground beef pizzas when I head to the pizza place. If I come back with onion, green pepper, and tofu in order to save calories there will be blood.
I kind of agree with the APC. You could say I’m down with the APC. Yeah you know me…
“I don’t see pizza counts dropping, and I don’t see salads running out the door,” That quote is oddly lyrical…
I can see their point. Pizza is very much an art, and not a science. Dough amounts vary, as well as toppings (cheese, sauce, other toppings).
Those pizzas aren’t an art. That’s kinda the whole point of creating a corporate supply chain and standardized production.
Go to the Red Robin menu page and click on the “Nutrition Customizer” link on the right nav.
http://www.redrobin.com/menu
I’ll grant you that this isn’t a nutrition board inside the restaurant, but this is a great way to figure out what the hell you’re eating. And when we went there recently for my daughter’s last-day-of-kindergarten celebration, this application actually influenced my order.
I never gave up my “Big Pizza” nickname from college. How dare they take it!
Just went to the http://www.cspinet.org/ website, not only are they pushing this nonsense, they are pushing for smaller drink sizes, and stopping marketing of Girl Scout goodies to children. Beginning to not like these guys.
I hated them ever since they made movie popcorn taste like crap by removing the coconut oil.
Now I don’t even see movies anymore. SEE THE CONNECTION
I need to start a Fatties Fraternity and start suing these kind of groups into submission. “Do what we say or we will sit on you!”
I’ve lost a little over 20 pounds in the past two months. I’ve done it by counting calories. I haven’t stopped going out to restaurants, just by stopping going out to restaurants that don’t list calorie information (with very rare exception for local, non-chain favorites where I’m quite careful what I order). Putting out the calorie information doesn’t stop people who care about calories from eating at your restaurant, to the contrary, it enables us to portion the meal to fit our needs. I don’t see why the pizza industry thinks this will hurt them. It’s information they already have. (Just as I don’t understand why the Cheesecake Factory doesn’t provide nutritonal information online or in all their restaurants, just in restaurants located in areas that mandate it, like Montgomery County, MD mentioned in the linked article.) The burden on these restaurants is minimal–they already have the data.
I’m working on shedding some excess tonnage, and I completely agree.
I’m restricting myself to a weekly calorie amount / composition, which results in an average daily count. If I know I’m going someplace that would put me over for that day, I can compensate on other days by taking in a little less.
When I can’t get a reasonable calorie count from one place, I choose another where I can get the information.
Waiting until you are standing there to order is the wrong time to try and figure out what to eat. Almost every chain has their nutritional info online. Far easier to plan your meal ahead of time, or even order it online. It’s nice to have the info available on a flyer at fast food joints as well. I personally find the numbers on the menu board very distracting. The information should be easily available, not mandated by law onto the menu board.
I have also been counting calories to lose a little weight. I went on a trip recently and was forced to eat out more than normal. You would be surprised at the number of restaurants that DON’T have their nutritional information available online (or those that make it very hard to find). It’s also hard to plan ahead if you’re traveling and don’t know ahead of time what restaurants are even there. I don’t even care if it’s on the menu board, but it would be great if they all at least had a pamphlet in the store.
This would be much easier to do as an App or on a kiosk at the store. As a single page paper with a matrix of dough sizes and ingredient volumes, it would be unwieldy and possibly confusing.
But if you could just run through an app and pick your type of dough and size, sauce (in its various flavors and volumes), and individual toppings, it could relatively easily show you all the nutritional info for a slice and/or whole pie based on what you chose.
Exactly. If they could just have a terminal or two, you could enter what you want to order and it will calculate the calories per slice for you. That should fulfill the regulation without having to build a whole new wall to list all the possible calorie counts, right?
I used to have a teacher in school that when kids complained about a certain assignment or said they needed more time, her response was that if you were offered a million dollars to have it done on time, do you think you could do it. Of course the answer was yes. I’ll use that same argument here. These pizza chains are complaining but I bet if their incentive was that they would pay no taxes for the next 5 years and the CEO would personally get a check for 20 million dollars from the US government, the calorie counts would be up within a week. So I understand why they are fighting it but my response is suck it up and get it done.
How about a compromise, people.
As much as I hate Big Brother telling us what to eat, I do think it is reasonable to expect restaurants to have nutrition information available.
If we must this information on the menu boards, how about this: Determine a serving size by weight (i.e., a serving is 4 ounces, no matter what size pizza). For each type of pizza, list the calorie count for one serving with cheese only.
Have printed material handy with nutrition information on toppings. Or have a webpage/app where you can build your pizza and it updates the calorie count each time you add an ingredient, like I have seen on other restaurant websites.
Big brother isnt telling you what to eat in this case, you Randian fool.
I haven’t had pizza in nearly six months. On a diet…lost a lot of weight. When the contest is over I’ll visit my local mom-and-pa shop; “Angies Pizza”. best pizza in the world! Well, my world anyway!
If you don’t know that pizza has a lot of calories, then I have no sympathy for you….
On the same token, I don’t understand why they can’t post calorie counts for individual sizes. It’s pretty easy.
if arby’s can make a build a meal calculator, i don’t see why pizza chains can’t. it would be a little more complicated if a large pizza gets more green peppers than a small, but it could be done.
put it on the website, put a terminal on location that people can use to access the site in store. the cost of menu boards is already pretty outrageous so i doubt a computer would be that much more expensive
link to arby’s meal calculator
http://www.arbys.com/food/build-a-meal-calculator.html
What does “overflow error” mean?
Dunlap Disease.
I think this will definitely help. Look at the steadily decreasing % of obese Americans since the addition of nutrition labeling on processed foods and drinks. Oh wait…
The calorie conscious usually know where to get the information they want, even in major chain restaurants, so I’m not sure if this is going to make much of a difference overall/
The restaurants won’t carry nutritional information unless mandated. Restaurants don’t even provide nutritional content in their locations that are in states that don’t require it, even if they have it available at other locations.
What’s your problem with me as a consumer being able to ask “what is in this thing” and being able to get a real answer?
Putting calories on the board won’t make people eat less. This is just another arrogant attempt by government to control people’s lives.
The calorie counts are readily available on the website. If yo do not have the foresight to do research ahead of time, then your lack of calorie information is of no concern to me. In addition, there is no moral obligation on the part of any restaurant to disclose calories; if you do not like the fact that a given restaurant does not disclose calories you are free to not do business at that restaurant.
> This is just another arrogant attempt by government to control people’s lives.
Boring conservative claptrap.
We’re talking about posting nutrtitional information, not banning pizza.
Giving people information they need to make informed decisions about what they purchase gives them MORE control, not less.
You do have control. You can choose not to do business with a pizza store that does not disclose its calorie counts. Really, is that so difficult?
There is no such thing as having a “right” to have pizza stores post calorie counts on their menu boards because that violates the private property rights of the pizza store in question.
Yes it is difficult because the competitive advantage will go to those companies that screw you the hardest. It doesn’t matter if it’s proper food labeling or mandatory arbitration. All corporations will race to the bottom unless something is done to stop them.
Regulation like Law in general provides a nice predictable set of expectations and even playing field for everyone.
You don’t have to put yourself at a disadvantage by not being a total psychopath.
“All corporations will race to the bottom unless something is done to stop them.”
By nature, corporations only exist to serve the interests of the shareholders. The boards have no obligation to act ethically. As a result, unregulated corporations will indeed race to the bottom.
“You can choose not to do business with…” doesn’t work with corporations that have basically infected the population’s bone marrow with public and financial influence. Government regulations are necessary to not only keep corporations in check, but to preserve what we know as the free market; when one is “too big to fail,” then we’re well on the way to oligopolies and monopolies (see: cable and telecommunications in the US).
Just who do you think creates the regulations? Large corporations frequently buy out regulations (regulatory capture) that suit them and hurt their competitors. Small businesses are frequently put at risk by onerous government regulations (lobbied for by larger corporations) that they can’t afford to comply with. Bernie Madoff got away with what he did, in a large part, because there are so many financial regulations that no one could even figure out if he was violating them.
Let’s take restaurant inspection for example. There is no need for these kinds of regulations or bureaucratic oversight in order to ensure safety when eating out at a restaurant.
Why?
1.Killing customers is bad for business. Not only will you not have any repeat customers but word of mouth will spread that your food is dangerous and no one will want to eat at your establishment.
2.The restaurant owners would be liable to the person they injured (or to their family if killed) and would have to pay full restitution to their victims. In a libertarian society, there would be no state-enforced “limited liability” and corporate owners would be fully and personally liable for the actions of their corporation.
3.If a restaurant is grossly negligent in food safety, has a track record of harming people, or harms a lot of people at once, the owners of that restaurant and anyone otherwise complicit would be liable criminally (again, no state-enforced “limited liability”) as they have committed an act of aggression against another’s person through their acts of gross negligence.
Restaurant inspections, as they are now, are little more than revenue generation activities for government where they fine businesses for the most ridiculous of things (e.g food was stored 5.5 feet off the ground instead of 6 or the chicken was 121.5 degrees instead of 122).
The banks are another example. In a libertarian society, the banks would have been allowed to fail. The failure of the banks would act in the place of strict regulation by the government and they would not longer be around to defraud people. Instead, the government used stolen money to bail the banks out and, to make matters worse, did not hold anyone accountable and allowed the CEOs to continue going on with their large salaries and bonuses as if nothing happened.
The CEOs and shareholders of the banks would have then been personally liable for the consequences of their actions and required, if found guilty after due process, to pay recompense to their victims out of their personal money and assets.
How exactly would you go about proving which meal made you sick?
> We’re talking about posting nutrtitional information
The Federal Government has no Constitutional authority to regulate posting of nutritional information in a restaurant.
Oh, and skip the “conservative/liberal” bullshit. This is a jurisdictional matter. Not a cable news show.
“The calorie counts are readily available on the website. If yo do not have the foresight to do research ahead of time, then your lack of calorie information is of no concern to me.”
Your concern with government control is also of no concern to me. Posting calorie counts is no different than opening your kitchen to a health inspector.
Are you aware that many households aren’t equipped with computers (and smartphones) outside of work? What if someone had planned to pick up a pizza, but the consumer’s internet access is temporarily down?
That said, I’m sure corporations are equally annoyed they must make the nutritional info available online.
It becomes a concern when you use the violence of the state to impose your will upon a private property owner who is engaged in a peaceful activity that does not violate your rights to person or property.
There is no requirement to buy pizza from X, Y, or Z pizza place. The owner of the pizza place is minding their own business. They have not committed force against person or property. No one forced you to go there. What’s next? Demanding that KFC reveal it’s 11 secret herbs and spices? Demanding that all restaurants submit their recipes for public inspection?
Shot in the dark: are you also a “men’s rights activist?” Because your statements are highly exaggerated and your victim-stance is laughable.
Vegetables are healthy and low in calories. As such no calorie count is needed.
I think this is a dumb rule to begin with. Especially here there’s way too many variables. I just took a look at a Dominos menu. There’s 9 different possible sizes and crust types, 4 types of sauces to choose from, and 26 different toppings.
What if the pizza isn’t cut into perfectly even shaped slices? Places that use the long blade cutter instead of the old style cutter don’t always do it perfectly even.
They should just do it like the Subway stores I’ve seen – include a single range of calories per product that is so wide as to be completely useless.
But at least they’d be meeting the requirement…
This is a bullshit regulation to begin with. Calorie counts have being proven to have no impact on reducing the number of calories customers consume in some cases calorie intake has increased.
Imagine how unwieldy a menu board listing all the different combinations would be. If there was a major demand for this service smart pizza places would have a calorie counter on their websites,
Also could we please never quote anyone from the “Center for Science in the Public Interest” ever again?
“Calorie counts have being proven to have no impact on reducing the number of calories “
Really? Since it has not been mandatory for restaurant chains it is amazing you can make this claim. Cite your sources, or are you just talking about your tiny little world?
“Imagine how unwieldy a menu board listing all the different combinations would be. “
Funny, they seem to have NO PROBLEM making a menu board that can put the prices up for each combination. Here would be an idea.
Pizza with sauce and cheese 1000 calories
additional items
Pepperoni 250
ham 200
double cheese 500
mushrooms 75
etc
You have three columns for each size and presto, you have it. They could easily put their meat lovers and vegetarian and philly cheese pizzas up there as well. This is a lie that is being spread by the morons who spent years selling crappy pizza, then made a commercial that says we are changing.
They did a study after New York enforced calorie information on menus, found no reduction in purchase sizes and in some cases an increase of calories as people tried to get more bang for their buck.
And honestly if you think it’s possible to design an attractive, practically sized and easy to read menu board that shows the information for literally hundreds of different possible combinations that I invite you to try.
Also if you are so feeble you need the government to make laws like this to protect you from yourself I don’t know how you’ve survived this long.
Perhaps they could waive the need to have a calorie count in place of having an additional tax put on the pizzas? Then it wouldn’t matter if people could see the calories or not because having a higher price, like .30 – .40, would cause 5% of people to not eat pizza in the first place.
Oh, come on. The real reason they don’t want to list calories anywhere is that nobody that cares about their weight would eat pizza ever again! Here’s a shocker for you all: Pizza is full of fat. The cheese alone is bad enough fat-wise, but you add pepperoni and sausage to that? I wouldn’t be surprised if pizza is at least 67% fat, calorie-wise. The crust is low-quality bleached flour, and it’s very glutinous (absolute death for someone with Celiac) and it’s overall very high in sodium (even worse than most fast food). Bottom line: If people were made fully aware of how poor pizza is nutritionally, they’d stop eating it, and pizza chains obviously don’t want that!
People know pizza is full of fat. They don’t care. If they don’t realize that then they are stupid and shouldn’t procreate.
You know damned well what’s going to happen *if* the pizza places are forced to display calorie counts..
They would display the calorie counts on a ‘Per Serving’ basis. Not per pizza, not per slice..per *serving*. (and a ‘serving’ at one of these places would be something stupid, like per 2/7th of a slice, just to make the math hard).
It’s the same with ‘serving sizes’ on a bag of chips. It’s pathetic. 1 serving = 12 chips. Who the hell would stop there? That’s what these places would do: use unrealisic serving sizes ending in a number which would be to difficult to do quick math on.
Otherwise, if a person saw that their pizza meal consists of 3-4 days of calories, they probably wouldn’t order it.
I stop at 6 now that I’ve decided my years-long vacation from dieting has gone on long enough and it’s time to get back into shape. Now I can’t imagine eating more than an ounce. But people on average eat a lot more and yes, a 20 oz soda is sold as a serving even though it’s more like 2, for example.
Calorie counts are based upon medium slice
Cheese pizza – 300
Topping counts based upon average serving per slice:
Pepperoni – 100
Sausage – 120
Bacon – 150
Mushrooms, Onion, Green Peppers, Jalapeno – 0
etc.
Doesn’t seem that difficult to me.
You know if you buy a slice of pepperoni pizza, you would have 300 +100 = 400 calories.
If people complain about doing math, they don’t care about the calorie count anyway.
I wish the APC good luck in their windmill-tilting endeavor. The people of America have spoken, and the loudest among them have said “We like being enslaved by the Nanny State!”
I don’t understand why they can’t do what McDonald’s used to do which is hand out a pamphlet that says calories in each item and then add the toppings on a separate section. So start with cheese as the base and then have the toppings separate.
I can picture certain men deliberately going for the highest-calorie slice – don’t wanna be a salad-eating Nancy, yo.