Sonic asset necessity heats up for high fat, salt and sugar brands amidst looming ad regulation changes

HFSS – High Fat Salt and Sugar

In the UK, when a product is categorised as HFSS it refers to being high in fat, sugar and/or salt or ‘less healthy’.

In July 2020 the government launched its tackling obesity strategy, to empower adults and children to live healthier lives. Obesity is one of the greatest long-term health challenges the UK faces.

Part of the governments’ action towards tackling obesity includes legislation to end the promotion of foods high in fat, sugar or salt (HFSS) by restricting volume promotions and placement in certain locations.

What are the changes?

For products like chocolate, fizzy drinks, crisps, right the way through to supermarkets, the new legislation will affect what they can say, and when they can say it.

This is ultimately a watershed between the hours of 5:30am And 9:00 at night for the TV, and a potential total restriction for online and digital advertising.

How will this impact brand management?

75% of brands put most of their media spend on TV, so brand managers will have to be more creative about their marketing channels and branding tactics employed in 2023.

Brands in the HFSS category are going to have to get a lot smarter about how they drive recall and recognition in key brand moments.

And how can sound help?

Sonic branding and audio advertising are exempt from these regulation changes, which means that they hold one of the golden tickets for getting into the ears and the minds of consumers.

Sonic branding is a holistic term for any way and every way a brand sounds; this can be a song, a jingle, an audio logo or even things like haptics, brand voice and product sounds, and have been proven to be 8% more effective than visual stimulus in a study of 2000 US advertisements in 2021 (IPSOS “Power of You” study).

For brand managers trying to develop distinctive brand assets before the watershed, now is the perfect time for HFSS brands to start thinking about how they can build their brands through sound.

Learn more about the power of sound here.