Where is sustainability? An assessment of vending products

Abstract

One way to make food sector more sustainable is to orient consumers towards di-ets that respect people, the planet, and society. According to recent research stud-ies, consumers have started to evaluate food products based on sustainable claims given on the packaging, but no study has focused on food products obtained through vending machines. Therefore, the aim of this study was to analyse which types of sustainable claims, if any, food products sold at vending machines show on their packaging. A content analysis was performed to this end, focusing on four locations within a town in northeast Italy. The results obtained from the analysis of 171 food products highlighted that, in general, products sold at vending ma-chines heavily lack textual and graphical information on sustainability.