http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2005-05-04-low-glycemic-foods_x.htm
Low-glycemic foods could hit sweet spot for dieters
By Bruce Horovitz, USA TODAY
What may be the next big thing in food marketing doesn't sound like a
bell ringer: Glycemic Index.
But get ready for foodmakers from Kraft to Kellogg to Atkins to tout it
as the next carb control. It's not low carb; it's slooooow carb. The
Glycemic Index - familiar to South Beach Diet followers - measures
how fast a carbohydrate is digested and raises blood-sugar levels.
High-glycemic carbs, such as refined flours, are quickly digested -
that's bad. Low-glycemic carbs, such as whole grains, are digested more
slowly - that's good. Food products touted as low glycemic seem to be
on a roll.
Last year, 175 new products were marketed as "low glycemic," vs. two in
1999, says Productscan Online. Some 33 more were rolled out through
this March.
Whole Foods sells some - including Solo GI Low Glycemic Bars. Even
Kroger soon will sell them, says Saul Katz, CEO of Solo GI Nutrition.
Tesco, one of the U.K.'s largest grocery chains, is now printing the
Glycemic Index on the labels of hundreds of products.
Some experts project low-glycemic food could become the next big diet
fad. Others says it's way too complex for American consumers. "Most
Americans never learned how to program their VCRs," says Tom Vierhile,
executive editor at Productscan. "So why would they bother paying
attention to their glycemic indexes?"
But the detailed Glycemic Index has better science behind it than most
low-carb diets, says Grant Ferrier, editor of Nutrition Business
Journal. He thinks it could be the next diet fad but won't take off as
fast as low carb.
Some familiar names on board:
·Kraft. The food giant owns Balance Bar, which touts its Balance
Trail Mix Bar as low glycemic. "It's for people who want to avoid an
energy spike and crash," says Abbe Serphos, a Kraft spokeswoman.
·Kellogg. The cereal giant owns Kashi, which promotes "optimized
glycemic response" on its new Golean Roll energy bars.
·Atkins. In the midst of the low-carb fad's slowdown, Atkins
Nutritionals is replacing the term "net carbs" on product packaging
with the term "Net Atkins Count" - an Atkins version of the Glycemic
Index that tallies the body's response to Atkins foods.
"Before anyone else was talking about it, Dr. Atkins had the original
low-glycemic program," says Vice President Colette Heimowitz.
·Russell Stover. The confectioner's new DiabetX candies -
prominently labeled "low glycemic" - were created with diabetics in
mind. Now it is studying how to use the low-glycemic term to appeal to
other consumers as well. "We believe, very soon, a lot of people will
be looking at low-glycemic levels," says marketing chief John O'Hara.
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More hair-splitting. More spin-doctoring. More semantics.
TC