IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/jagaec/v46y2014i02p173-191_00.html

The Effect of Calorie Labels on Caloric Intake and Restaurant Revenue: Evidence from Two Full-Service Restaurants

Author

Listed:
  • Ellison, Brenna
  • Lusk, Jayson L.
  • Davis, David

Abstract

Field experiment data were used to study the effect of numeric calorie labels in two full-service restaurants. Ultimately, both field experiments, despite using different experimental designs, reached the same conclusion: the numeric calorie label had no significant effect on total caloric intake. However, results revealed the addition of a traffic light symbol to the numeric label led to a 67.8-kcal reduction in average calories ordered. Furthermore, results showed restaurant revenue is unlikely to be affected by the addition of calorie labels on menus. The results have implications for restaurant labeling laws that are being considered around the world.

Suggested Citation

  • Ellison, Brenna & Lusk, Jayson L. & Davis, David, 2014. "The Effect of Calorie Labels on Caloric Intake and Restaurant Revenue: Evidence from Two Full-Service Restaurants," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 46(2), pages 173-191, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jagaec:v:46:y:2014:i:02:p:173-191_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1074070800000729/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. repec:osf:socarx:vy6af_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Saksena, Michelle J. & Okrent, Abigail M. & Anekwe, Tobenna D. & Cho, Clare & Dicken, Christopher & Effland, Anne & Elitzak, Howard & Guthrie, Joanne & Hamrick, Karen S. & Hyman, Jeffrey & Jo, Young &, 2018. "America’s Eating Habits:Food Away From Home," Economic Information Bulletin 281119, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    3. Tabaré Capitán & Linda Thunström & Klaas van ’t Veld & Jonas Nordström & Jason F. Shogren, 2026. "Show me the labels: Using pre-nudges to reduce calorie information avoidance," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 72(1), pages 1-39, February.
    4. Caputo, Vincenzina & Sun, Jiayu & Van Loo, Ellen J., 2025. "Evaluating policy and industry-based interventions for healthier online food-away-from-home choices: A scoping review," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    5. Vincenzina Caputo & Jayson L. Lusk, 2020. "What agricultural and food policies do U.S. consumers prefer? A best–worst scaling approach," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 51(1), pages 75-93, January.
    6. Huseynov, Samir & Palma, Marco A. & Ahmad, Ghufran, 2021. "Does the magnitude of relative calorie distance affect food consumption?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 530-551.
    7. Valerie Kilders & Vincenzina Caputo & Jayson L. Lusk, 2024. "Consumer preferences for food away from home: Dine in versus delivery," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 106(2), pages 496-525, March.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • Q18 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Agricultural Policy; Food Policy; Animal Welfare Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:jagaec:v:46:y:2014:i:02:p:173-191_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/aae .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.