Published: August 2017

ID #: CAS027

Journal: Appetite

Authors: Smith Taillie L, Ng SW, Xue Y, Harding M

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This study examines trends in the prevalence of price promotions among packaged food and beverage purchases, differences in prevalence by household race/ethnicity or income, and the association between price promotions and the nutritional profile of purchases. The cross-sectional study uses a dataset of 90 million purchases from 38,744 (2008) to 45,042 (2012) U.S. households in 2008–2012. Prevalence of price promotions among packaged food and beverage purchases increased by 8 percent and 6 percent, respectively, from 2008 to 2012, with both reaching 34 percent by 2012. Higher-income households had greater proportions of purchases with price promotions than lower-income households. Asian households had the highest proportion of purchases with any price promotion, followed by non-Hispanic whites. While total price-promoted packaged food purchases had higher mean energy, total sugar, and saturated fat densities than purchases with no price promotions, absolute differences were small. Overall, no clear associations emerged between presence of price promotions and nutritional quality of purchases.

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