Clean Label Foods: Why Familiar Ingredients and Taste Matter Most

Clean label means different things to different shoppers

The central problem for food companies is that “clean label” has no settled definition. As concerns about ultraprocessed foods grow, shoppers may use the phrase to mean a short ingredient list, familiar ingredients, or the absence of artificial colors, flavors and preservatives. Those interpretations can overlap, but they don’t point to the same product changes. That ambiguity leaves brands guessing whether to change how many ingredients a product contains or which ingredients it uses.

Innova Market Insights research points to familiarity as the stronger cue. Mimi Bonnett, the firm’s senior director of Insights, said consumers often want ingredients they recognize, can pronounce or might keep in their own pantry. “Fundamentally [consumers] are equating clean label with nothing that they don't recognize,” she said at a virtual Food Dive event. For shoppers, the appeal may be reassurance more than any formal standard. A familiar name can feel like a useful signal, even when it doesn’t explain how an ingredient works or how the food was made.

That distinction gets blurred when brands make “nonultraprocessed” claims. Consumers may judge both labels by the ingredients they see, Bonnett said, even though processing and ingredient composition are different questions. “’Processed’ is in the term, but it's not about the process at all,” she said, adding that shoppers generally don’t understand the processes foods undergo. Innova found that one in five consumers who avoid ultraprocessed foods are avoiding particular ingredients, not necessarily processing methods. That finding suggests the label a company chooses may not match the concern a shopper has in mind. Bonnett said consumers tend to know what they don’t want more clearly than what they do.

For companies, the practical lesson is to explain ingredients plainly. Bonnett described consumer understanding of food origins as “murky”; clearer ingredient information may help whether or not a product carries a clean label claim. That kind of explanation can give shoppers more to assess than a broad promise on the package. The research doesn’t establish one definition shoppers will accept, which makes broad claims difficult to interpret. The numbers here are underwhelming as a guide to a single market definition, but useful as a warning about how differently shoppers can read the same wording.

Reformulation has to preserve the eating experience

Removing ingredients can create new problems. Jay Bunte, Ingredion’s senior director for its global product portfolio in corn and clean label texture solutions, said each ingredient serves a purpose, from stability and texture to shelf life and processing tolerance. An ingredient that looks unnecessary to a shopper may still be doing work in the product. Simply cutting ingredients, he warned, can leave food tasting worse.

Some ingredients with daunting names—including titanium dioxide, datum and monodisaccharide, as listed in the event discussion—perform specific functions. Finding more natural substitutes that do the same job can be difficult, and Bunte said companies need reliable supply chains for replacements. A substitute has to fit the formulation and arrive consistently enough for production. A shorter ingredient list can signal simplicity, he said, but ingredient count alone is a poor measure of how clean a food is. What those ingredients are matters more.

Texture is an early test of whether a reformulation works: it’s often the first quality to suffer and the first change consumers notice. Taste matters too, particularly as people taking GLP-1 medications seek nutrient-dense foods with minimal processing. High-protein, high-fiber products can turn gritty, chalky or dense, Bunte said. Ingredion’s clean label texture solutions, he argued, can help make smaller portions feel creamy or indulgent. That’s a formulation challenge with direct consequences for whether consumers will eat the product. A product that meets a label goal but disappoints at the table may not earn a repeat purchase. The eating experience is the test.

Cost belongs in the equation as well. Bunte described a yogurt maker that used a clean label texturizer to reduce its dependence on expensive dairy fat, lowering the total reformulation cost. His point: ingredient price by itself doesn’t capture the economics. Companies need to consider how a formulation affects the product’s overall cost and use, including what one ingredient can replace or help preserve. If you're working in this space, the relevant question is whether the change holds up across the recipe and the production process, not just whether the replacement ingredient looks cheaper on its own.

Clear claims depend on trade-offs

Clean label reformulation sits between consumer expectations and practical constraints. Familiarity can reassure shoppers, but a recognizable ingredient list doesn’t tell them everything about processing. Removing an ingredient can simplify a label while weakening texture, taste or shelf life; replacing it can bring sourcing demands and new costs. Here's the thing: no single cue resolves those trade-offs for a shopper or a manufacturer.

That said, the discussion points to a useful standard for brands: make claims specific enough to explain what changed, and keep the product’s performance in view. Bonnett’s findings suggest shoppers may be responding to unfamiliar ingredients, while Bunte’s examples show why those ingredients can be hard to replace. The source doesn’t establish which claims will win consumer trust or how companies will balance these demands. It does make clear that ingredient count alone won’t answer the question. Clear explanations and a product people still want to eat may matter more than a shorter list.

Editor’s note: This article draws on an Oct. 28 Food Dive event about health and wellness innovation by consumer packaged goods brands. Watch the replay on demand.