This is not just rye flour. Or is it?

This week, someone contacted the Real Bread Campaign to say that the labelling of M&S own-brand 'Light Rye Flour' had left them confused.

What M&S does and doesn't say

M&S makes the prominent, front-of-pack claim: 'ancient wheat variety'. While rye and wheat are both cereals in the Pooideae sub-family of grasses, they are not members of the same genus, let alone varieties of the same species.

The blue panel on the pack rear, which M&S typically uses to publish ingredients lists on its products, simply gives an allergen declaration: 'Contains Rye and Gluten' - with no mention of the wheat highlighted by the front-of-pack claim.

Rather than clarification, the product page on the M&S website confuses matters further. It states the ingredients to be: Wheatflour contains Gluten (with Wheatflour, Calcium Carbonate, Iron, Niacin, Thiamin) – with no mention of the rye highlighted by the product name.

The product description on that page then includes the factually-incorrect statement: '… our Light Rye Flour is milled from an ancient wheat variety…’

What is it?

Is this flour milled from:

1. Rye (Secale cereale)?
2. An ‘ancient’ species of wheat, such as einkorn (Triticum monococcum) or emmer (T. turgidum subsp. dicoccum)?
3. ‘Common’ or ‘bread’ wheat (Triticum aestivum)?
4. A mixture of two or more of the above?
5. Something else?

From which ‘ancient’ variety, of whichever species of wheat and / or rye, is this flour produced?

How do shoppers find the correct information?

If it is a mixture of flours, where is the full ingredients list, including the legally-required QUID to name the 'ancient' variety (or, at least, species) of wheat and show the percentage of it and rye that the flour contains; and allergen declarations for both wheat and rye?

We presume that M&S uses the descriptor ‘light’ in this context to denote that the flour is sifted, as opposed to being 100% wholegrain ‘dark’ rye flour, rather than a variety of rye that is lighter in colour. Is this correct and is the average consumer likely to understand this? If it is sifted, wouldn’t it be better for M&S to say so in the product description, perhaps even including the extraction rate?

We asked two members of staff in one M&S store but neither could answer any of these questions. One even said ‘rye is a type of wheat, isn’t it?’ 

On 23 May 2025, we emailed these questions to M&S, asking what action the company will take to amend its labelling, marketing and information provision online and in-store, and your timescale for doing so.

Cereal offenders?

It’s not just M&S. We have raised a number of labelling and marketing questions and concerns about most of the UK's largest supermarket chains and industrial dough fabricators, notably around ‘wholemeal’ marketing and ‘freshly baked in store today’ type claims. 

However, M&S seems to be generating more questions and concerns than some of the other chains, also using the claim ‘only 5 ingredients’ to market a product for which the legal declaration lists 11 ingredients; and using a front-of-pack ‘heritage wheat’ claim, without giving the legally-required quantitative ingredient declaration (QUID) to name the variety and state the amount the product contains.

We wonder: is M&S attempting to profit from using the marketing value of such descriptors and claims to entice shoppers to pay premium prices and, if so, whether they are doing so out of ignorance or deliberate deceit?

(Before anyone raises the issue of hackers compromising M&S in April 2025, all of the issues we are investigating pre-date that cyber attack.)

Updates

23 May 2025: M&S replied: 'I have had a look into this, and regrettably I have not been able to locate the information you have requested. I have, however, raised this with our Food Technologists. Once I get a response from them, I will get back in touch with you with the information they provided.'