Because of the change in the way of Nutella is consumed in the United States, Ferrero has recently pushed for the product to be reclassified from topping to dessert, which would put it in the same category as honey and jam.
The Food and Drug Administration is the institution responsible for carrying out the investigation of the product's reclassification conditions. If approved, the change would reduce the serving size of the spread product from two tablespoons in 2014 to one tablespoon, which would also cut in half the calories displayed on the product label.
The argument of the Ferrero management was that fewer calories would equal more sales.
"The current serving size is two tablespoons, or 37 grams, equaling 200 calories. Nutella maker Ferrero thinks a smaller serving size - with fewer calories - might make people more likely to grab a jar from supermarket shelves," explained the Ferrero petition.
The Facts Behind The Spread
The product tastes like a combination of hazelnuts and cocoa, being a creamy dessert with a very specific and recognizable taste and flavor. Currently, the product is classified to have 546 kilocalories per 100 grams, which translates to 81 kilocalories per a 15-gram portion.
The product ingredients are sugar, palm oil, hazelnuts (13 percent), low-fat cocoa (7.4 percent), skimmed milk powder (6.6 percent) and whey powder (milk). The emulsifiers Nutella uses are lecithin (soya) and vanillin.
While the amount of Nutella produced every year weighs the same as the Empire State Building according to its website, back in 1946 when the company was founded, the recipe hadn't attracted nearly as many customers as it does today.
It was in 1964 when the Nutella recipe as we know it today was created, after approximately two decades of trial and error recipes to find the most suitable combination of flavors for its public. One year later, the iconic jar was first used as packaging for the product, starting an era of great success for the Italian and international customers.
However poetic the branding story of this product is, its initial purpose was practical. The cream was invented as a solution to a huge problem Europe had after the end of World War Two - the cocoa shortage. But because of the success of the recipe, the product arrived in Australia in 1978 after having impressed the entire European continent.
Further proof of the product's success in both marketing and sales was the organic reach of 10 million Facebook likes just one year after the page was created. Today, the page has earned more than 31 million likes from chocolate enthusiasts.
