This week saw the new Nestle Milkybar Wowsomes bars land in Tesco. By Tuesday I had visited five shops without success when I found them in the Tesco Express opposite Gloucester Road tube station.
Wowsomes is (are?) the first chocolate bar in the world to use Nestle’s innovative sugar reduction technique. According to the press release, Nestle have “transformed the structure of sugar through a newly developed process using only natural ingredients. Inspired by candy floss, experts created aerated, porous particles of sugar that dissolve more quickly in the mouth. This allows someone to perceive the same level of sweetness as before while consuming less sugar.”
The current Public Health England Sugar Reduction project (in which I participate) has encouraged manufacturers to work to a maximum sugar content that averages out at 43.7g per 100g chocolate by 2020. For dark chocolate and high cocoa solids milk chocolate this is manageable but white chocolate presents a greater challenge. Nestle are to be congratulated on the elegant technological solution they have delivered.
How does it taste? Comparisons to the parent Milkybar are tricky because Milkybar is a solid bar but Wowsomes has a filling of crispy oat cereal pieces. In terms of sweetness I could perceive little difference between the two. The fact that all ingredients used in Wowsomes are natural means it has none of the unpleasant tastes associated with artificial sweeteners, another point in its favour.
Where Wowsomes makes less sense is when you compare nutritional information. Traditional Milky Bar contains 52.6% sugar: Wowsomes is only 30.6%, justifying the prominent onpack claim of “30% Less Sugar!”. However the energy content of the bars is almost identical – 543 kcals per 100g for traditional Milkybar, 527 kcals per 100g for Wowsomes. The most significant difference between the bars is weight: traditional is 25g, Wowsomes is 18g.
Wowsomes comes in at 95 calories per bar as opposed to 136 calories for a traditional Milkybar. The most significant cause of this difference is the reduction in bar size.
Consumers will undoubtedly be impressed by a bar that proudly proclaims 30% Less Sugar and still tastes sweet. The UK soft drinks industry has recent and very painful experience of what happens to your sales if sugar-reduction NPD is perceived as negatively affecting taste. If consumers are looking for reduced-sugar products to protect their teeth then Wowsomes is potentially useful. However we know from PHE that the most important consequence of excessive sugar consumption is weight gain and its subsequent health problems. Wowsomes is only 3% lower in calories than a traditional Milkybar. Can this help us to become a healthier nation?