Asda has said that it will remove sweets from some of its checkouts and replace them with healthier snacks and pieces of fruit.
Penny Coates, the private-label director of Asda said that the idea is to run at checkouts on a trial basis in January.
Asda, which has 265 stores in Britain, was recently named the “worst offender in a Food Commission survey of supermarkets sweet displays targeting children. The store's reviewed checkout policy means that a medium-sized store of 20 checkout will have four or five sweet free tills, which will be marked as healthy checkouts.
Coates said: “We need to do this in a controlled way. Customers are used to buying sweets at checkouts so we have to make sure this works before we roll it out to all.”
The announcement follows the October launch of “Chuck Snacks Off the Checkout” campaign by the Parents Jury, a pressure group of mums and dads demanding healthier food for their children. The survey found that Asda had an average of 2.4 displays of sweets, crisps or soft drinks at its checkouts.
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