ITV investigation into junk food at high street checkouts

The ITV Tonight documentary (available to watch on ITV Hub online until late March) went undercover to show the scale of sweets, chocolates and other less healthy products being sold at the checkouts and near the tills of many high street non-food retailers, including shops which can see high footfall from children and teenagers. 

This is an area which the Children's Food Campaign, together with Junk Free Checkouts campaign partners British Dietetic Association and British Dental Association, have been pressing for action for several years.  

The retailers gave these responses to ITV:

Waterstones
"The chocolate we sell is exactly what we hope our customers want to buy, and want to receive, on a special occasion associated with chocolate - Easter, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day and Christmas. We sell nicely packaged, attractive chocolate at these times to be bought as presents. It is precisely this focus on chocolates as special treats which keeps them special, rather than ordinary. Adverse dietary consequences come from making chocolate ordinary and so an everyday staple - Waterstones is manifestly doing the opposite."

Superdrug
“We take the issue of health and nutrition very seriously and our customers’ wellbeing remains one of our core values. We are currently reviewing our whole snacking range as part of a wider food and drink strategy. We have reduced our confectionery range, and will be replacing crisps with a healthier snacking range from May this year as well as introducing a wider range of reduced sugar and calorie soft drinks.”

Homebase
Although the core Homebase product range is focused on home and garden improvement projects, we offer a very limited range of confectionary in our stores that is popular with our customers.

WHSmiths
“WHSmith is a very small player in the UK confectionery market with around just 1.5% of the overall share.  All staff are trained on promotions, in particular never offering confectionery products to children or parents with children. Our most popular and extensively run till point promotion continues to be a free bottle of mineral water when you buy a copy of The Daily Telegraph.”

Topshop
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Boots
“At Boots we know we have a vital role in supporting our customers to make healthy choices, and we recognise the huge challenge that a busy lifestyle presents for them. Every week our colleagues provide care and advice to millions of customers and patients, and help them get the information, products, services and support they need to make the best choices they can. Specifically on nutrition, we have already introduced even more options for healthier snacking in our stores, whilst still giving our customers the wide range of products they tell us they want. We have also already begun reducing the visibility of chocolate and sweets throughout our stores, including at till points. Our intention is to have our tills free of all chocolate and sweets by mid-April 2016.”