A new grocery food packaging scanning smartphone application allows customers to match products to their personal diet and health needs. The service is being launched by Sifter Solutions, a food and nutrition technology provider designed for food retailers, health and insurance platforms.
“Sifter Scan By Diet allows the shopper to set their own personal diet profile, using scientifically accurate toggles, before scanning. This is critically important for persons with, for instance, a medical condition like diabetes or food allergies,” Pierce Hollingsworth, chief content officer at Sifter Solutions, tells Nutrition Insight.
The service responds to the current market demands driven by Gen Z and millennial customers, of which close to 75% buy specific foods for specific health benefits. According to The Food Industry Association, 44% of Gen X and baby boomers have the same food purchasing habits. 
Sifter Scan By Diet allows the shopper to set their own personal diet profile (Image Credit: Sifter).
How it works
The Scan By Diet application can be used to select and combine a variety of diets, such as those prescribed for specific health conditions like diabetes, hypertension and food allergens.
“When scanning the packaging of the food products, they can instantly see whether it’s appropriate for their custom diet.” A green check following the scan means that the food is suitable to the diet selected in the customer’s profile. A red X means the opposite, and the application suggests alternatives.
“If a product is not, Sifter then suggests similar products that will meet their diet specifications,” explains Hollingsworth.
“People can personalize their shopping experience to their specific health profile and preferences. Sifter dramatically and accurately speeds the shopping process and helps people support their diets while offering a wider variety of appropriate food options.”
Hollingsworth outlines some of Scan By Diet’s additional features, like Recipe Sifter, which allows customers to cut and paste a recipe URL and see which ingredients fit, with product recommendations for those that do not. “This supports people using multiple products to create meals and plan for parties that may have guests on special diets.”
Nutritionist, dietitian consumer base
Hollingsworth explains that the tool would be of great use to nutritionists and dietitians who often find that their patients have difficulty deciphering food labels to ensure they follow dietary instructions.
“It fits anywhere there’s an opportunity to help people find and purchase foods that support their personal diets and those of their families.” Sifter asserts that the service will help nutritionists, dieticians and regular customers alike.
“This type of hyper-personalization is a win-win for food retailers and their customers,” states Thomas Parkinson, chief product officer for Sifter Solutions. “Health-focused shoppers enjoy a better in-store experience because the ‘Matches your Diet’ feature directs them to a wider variety of suitable grocery foods. That means happier customers, bigger baskets, and better margins for the grocery retailer.”
Considering the size of both the retail grocery and health markets, according to Hollingsworth, every grocery chain will eventually support their diet-driven shoppers with the ability to shop according to their custom diet profile. “Sifter offers this technology and the supporting quality product data to do this now.”
“In the health market, insurers and health technology companies focus on ‘food as medicine.’ It’s well known that a better diet can lead to better health outcomes, higher quality lives and lower cost to the healthcare system on all levels. Sifter technology provides the means to connect insured, healthcare patients, and food benefit card recipients with foods that fit their specific medical and diet requirements.”