By now we're all used to seeing the various "New and Improved!" claims that marketers slap on their products. "More Buttery Than Ever!," "Now More Cleaning Power!," and so on. After a lifetime of being assaulted with these declarations on a near-daily basis, we tend to become blind to them -- they fade into the background. Personally, I've become so inured to such language that I almost overlooked one of the more curious recent examples of the genre: a can of Progresso Red Clam Sauce with Tomato and Basil, emblazoned with a banner that reads, "Now More Flavor!"
Just think about that for a moment. In a world of ever-increasing specificity, "Now More Flavor!" is a strikingly generic claim. Do they mean more tomatoey flavor? More clammy flavor? The hype is so vague that it seems to invite dubious speculation -- somewhere out there, no doubt, is a cynic who's thinking, "I bet they just watered down the sauce so that it now has a more watery flavor." And yes, ladies and gentlemen, I confess that I am that cynic.
Compounding the confusion is the sauce's ingredient listing, which includes one of those maddeningly meaningless terms: "natural flavor." It's the last item on the list, which means it's the smallest proportionate ingredient in the product. Did Progresso simply make a token increase to the trace amount of natural flavor -- from 0.01% to 0.03%, for example -- in order to make its "Now More Flavor!" claim?
With these questions in mind, I called Progresso's toll-free consumer hotline, where a friendly customer-service representative named Chandra patiently listened to my queries. After consulting her computer database, she said, "It's spices -- we increased the spices." This sounded as frustratingly vague as the initial flavor claim. Which spices were we talking about here? "I don't know," she said. "All I know is that we increased the spices." So that's how big companies like Progresso plot their marketing strategies: An extra pinch of garlic powder, maybe a dash of paprika, and presto, "Now More Flavor!" It all felt rather anti-climactic.
As long as I had Chandra on the phone, I asked her what "natural flavor" means. After clicking her way through a few computer menus, she read me the definition: "Flavors derived from natural sources, such as juices, rinds, and herbs." Naturally (no pun intended), she didn't know which natural sources were used in this particular product. The whole situation seemed like a game whose object was to stay as vague as possible.
Interestingly, the Progresso folks are much more specific when it comes to tomatoes, which appear in four different guises in the sauce's ingredients listing: tomato paste, concentrated crushed tomatoes, tomato juice, and plain old tomatoes. If they keep providing that level of detail, they're going to lose the vagueness game. I suggest just grouping together all of these tomato-related ingredients under a single term: natural red coloring.
(Progresso Quality Foods, PO Box 555, Vineland, NJ 08360)