Tempting treats are cleared from the tills at Aldi

It’s great news that Aldi has announced that it will stop selling confectionery and unhealthy foods at its checkouts. This follows trials carried out around the country, with full roll-out from January.

Aldi are not the first to do this – Lidl announced similar plans earlier in the year and Tesco also extended a longer standing policy to remove confectionery from the tills in their smaller, as well as larger stores. Other supermarkets introduced policies several years ago, but don’t usually apply them in their smaller convenience stores.

Robust approach from Aldi

In the case of Aldi, the criteria for what they allow takes account of Government criteria for what’s healthy enough to be advertised to children on TV, the new targets for salt levels in foods and the traffic light labelling scheme – so pretty robust.

Aldi’s trials found that not only is this likely to be better for people’s health, it also makes sense for their profits too – as there was no negative impact.

The issue of promotions has been an area that the Government has been calling on the food industry to act on for a while through its Public Health Responsibility Deal – whether that’s positioning in store, tighter controls on the ways foods are marketed to children or the balance of foods in price promotions. The response has been disappointingly slow.

Public Health Responsibility Deal

Our surveys show that many people find it annoying that promotions are too often on the unhealthier, rather than healthier foods and so want there to be more of a balance. We therefore need to see more action across all of the retailers.

I’m hoping that one day I’ll be able pick up a newspaper or fill up at the petrol station without being cajoled to buy chocolate or sweets that I don’t want.

Does this drive you mad too – and, if so, who do you think is the worst for unhealthy promotions?