If you’re walking down the aisle of a grocery store and you’re in the middle of a Whole 30 diet – or you’re vegan, or diabetic, or allergic to a particular ingredient, or eating paleo – you can use a new app to scan the back of a package and get a personalized nutrition label that focuses specifically on the ingredients and nutritional information you care about.
If you’re diabetic, for example, the app, called Pinto, will see if a product has added sugars and how much fiber it has compared to carbs. Someone trying to manage heart health can see if food is high in sodium or saturated fat. Someone with irritable bowel syndrome will get a warning if food is high in lactose or fructose, which can make their symptoms worse. If you’re on a keto diet, it will focus on net carbs, fat, protein, and sodium.
“What we saw in the space was there’s a tremendous amount of data and information that’s potentially out there about food and about nutrition, but the way that data is sourced and the way that it gets to consumers isn’t really from the lens of what a consumer today needs,” says cofounder and CEO Sam Slover.
The detailed database that the app needed to work didn’t exist, so the startup built it from scratch, working directly with food manufacturers and grocery stores like Whole Foods, Kroger, and Campbells. Some of the information you can get in the app, like added sugars, isn’t shown on standard nutrition labels. And current labels don’t account for the increasingly divergent way that consumers eat. The startup built a data science engine that takes all of the raw nutritional data and classifies it against specific consumer needs. “Essentially what we’re able to do is, given any user and their diet, we pull out the exact information you need to know about a product,” says Slover.
It’s a reflection of where the food industry is headed, Slover says: Consumers are looking for healthier food, they’re making choices based on the “food tribe” they identify with, and the industry is moving digital. “The data that we’re producing about food in terms of how it powers personalization, and getting the right product in front of the right consumer, is one of the harder and more interesting challenges in grocery, in nutrition, and food right now,” he says.
Our 3 Favorite Features:
Personalized Info: Scan a barcode or search for a food and the app highlights the info that’s most relevant for you. It will also give you an analysis on how well it fits your diet/goals (it uses a color-coding system that’s personalized for your diet)
Diet Tracking Made Easier: Track your diet and see how you’re doing against your targets (the app uses image recognition so you just need to snap a photo of your meals on the iPhone app)
Food Finding: Search and find foods that fit your individual need/preferences (for example: Yogurts that do not have added sugars and are high in protein, or Ice Creams that are Keto)