60,000 Maggi kits sold out in 5 mins on Snapdeal

It took just 5 minutes for 60,000 welcome kits of Maggi to be sold out on Snapdeal as consumers thronged the e-commerce platform to lap up their 2-minute instant noodles.
Earlier this week, Snapdeal had announced that it will sell Nestle's Maggi via a unique flash sale model as the noodles brand made a comeback after a gap of five months.
Maggi was banned after it was allegedly found to have lead content beyond permissible limits.
While registrations for Maggi's welcome kit (containing 12 packs of Maggi, a 2016 Maggi calendar, a Maggi fridge magnet, Maggi post cards and a 'Welcome Back' letter) opened up on November 9, the sale began today on Snapdeal.
Snapdeal sold out the first batch of 60,000 Maggi Welcome Kits within 5 minutes of Maggi Flash Sale going live today.
"There has been much anticipation for the return of one of the favourite Indian brands and we have witnessed a phenomenal response to this sale from customers across the country," Snapdeal Senior Vice-President (Partnerships and Strategic initiatives) Tony Navin said.
Flash sales or deal-of-the-day is an e-commerce business model in which a website offers a single product for sale for a limited period of time.
Potential customers have to register to avail of the deal. A new batch of Maggi WelcomeKits will be on sale from November 16.
Maggi has been relaunched in 100 towns through 300-odd distributors and is being rolled out in a staggered manner across the country, except in eight states where it is still not allowed.
The popular brand of noodles had passed tests by three government-accredited laboratories, as ordered by the Bombay High Court which in August had lifted ban on the instant noodles that was imposed by food safety regulators. Maggi was banned in June by Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) which stated that it was unsafe and hazardous for consumption due to presence of lead beyond permissible limits. The company had withdrawn the noodles brand from the market.

FDA calls for cap on sugar intake

Says Limit Consumption To 50gDay
For the first time, the Food and Drug Administration has recommended a cap on sugar consumption for Americans.
The goal is to limit added sugar to no more than 10% of daily calories, according to the proposed guidelines. For someone older than 3, it means eating no more than 12.5 teaspoons, or 50 grams, of it a day .That's about the same amount of sugar found in a can of Coke.
But for most people, giving up sugary drinks will not be enough to meet the recommendations. Caloric sweeteners are also lurking in foods with health appeal, like lowfat yogurt, canned fruit and wholegrain breads. “There is a lot of hidden sugar in our food supply ,“ said Dr. Frank Hu.
Currently , nutrition labels on food packaging reveal only the total amount of sugar in a product. The FDA has said it wants to change the labels to help consumers distinguish between the amount of naturally occurring sugar and the amount of added sugar. “Fruit yogurts could contain a tiny amount of real fruit in there and an awful lot of added sugar, or lots of fruit and dairy and little added sugar, and the consumer cannot distinguish between the two,“ said Susan Mayne, the director of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition at the FDA.
Critics have balked at the sugar cap and the new label requirements, saying the new labels will only confuse shoppers. “Metabolically speaking, our bodies don't differentiate between added and natural sugars,“ said Kris Sollid, a dietitian and director of nutrients communications for the International Food Information Council. If people are watching their weight, he said, “it's more important to look at total calories.“
The 10% cap by FDA was derived from modeling different kinds of healthy diet patterns -American, Mediterranean and vegetarian -and determining how many discretionary calories are left over for sugar after an individual gets the nutrients he or she needs.
Sugar makes up about 13.5% of Americans' caloric intake, so public health experts think the goal of 10 percent is attainable. But that's an average figure: Younger people, blacks and the poor tend to consume higher amounts of sugar and would need to make deeper cuts to reach the goal.

City lab found lead levels in Maggi within permissible limits

HYDERABAD: At a time when the Swiss major Nestle India Private Limited is making a comeback into the `two-minute noodles' segment with the relaunch of Maggi, it has now surfaced that the popular `snack' was given a clean chit by city-based Vimta Labs Ltd in October.
The city lab, accredited by both NABL (National Accreditation Board for Testing & Calibration Laboratories) and Food Safety and Standards Authority of India's (FSSAI), tested five samples. They found that the lead content in Maggi's noodles and tastemaker was below 0.05 parts per million (ppm) as against 2.5 ppm, the maximum permissible limit fixed by FSSAI.
While confirming that they had undertaken the quality analysis for five freshly-manufactured Maggi stocks before it hit the market on Monday , a representative from the business development wing of Vimta Labs Ltd told TOI that they entered the scene following B o m b ay H i g h C o u r t 's August 13 order directing Nestle to conduct fresh tests before re-launching its products.
"The company did not approach us on its own. It acted on the Bombay High court's order to check whether the lead level in the five Maggi Masala noodles samples that were manufactured in October were within permissible limits or not," said a representative from the lab.
In fact, Nestle representatives maintained that similar quality analysis -to detect lead levels -was conducted by two other laboratories - the Mohali-based Punjab Biotechnology Incu bator and CEG Test House & Research Centre Pvt Ltd in Jaipur.
A copy of the summary of test results of Maggi Masala noodles (available with TOI) shows that all the samples that were picked up by the food safety officer, Moga, on October 26, before sending them for testing at the three different labs showed lead content to be less than 0.05 ppm in both the noodles and tastemaker.
Surprisingly, however, the test results made available by Nestle on its website coinciding with the relaunch of Maggi on Monday, did not make any mention of the presence or absence of monosodium glutamate (MSG) used as flavour enhancer.
It may be recalled that not just the Delhi-based FSSAI, even the state food laboratory in Nacharam had accused Nestle of resorting to misbranding after they found MSG in most of its samples in June. This, de spite the "no added MSG" written on the packets.
When contacted, Rum jhum Gupta, senior manager, corporate communications, Nestle India Ltd maintained that "artificia MSG is never added to Mag gi products but is naturally present in some ingredients like hydrolysed groundnut protein, onion powder and wheat flour that are used in preparation of the product" "However, to be techni cally correct without sound ing misleading in the firs place, packets of all new Maggi products do not have the phrase "no added MSG" this time," she added.

SNACKING UP - Maggi ban: Sandwich makers gain

Bengaluru: Sandwich makers, popcorn makers and bread were the big gainers from the Maggi ban, and now, as Maggi returns to store shelves, these categories might return to their traditional rates of growth.
Data shared by e-tailer Flipkart showed that sales of snack makers -products like toasters, sandwich makers, popcorn makers and other small kitchen appliances -rose 50% month-onmonth from June, a huge leap from the 10% month-onmonth growth in the one year prior to June. The Maggi ban started taking effect from Ju ne 5, after food regulator Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) ordered the company to withdraw all variants of the brand, calling them unsafe for human consumption.
Flipkart's data also showed that while the unprecedented growth in snack ma kers was visible across the country , student towns like Manipal and Vellore and hill stations like Dehradun, Shimla and Ooty were the biggest sales drivers. Maggi was known to be enormously popular in colder climes, and with college students, especially those that stayed in hos tels. “Every noon I used to have a bowl of Maggi in the college canteen. After it was banned in May , I switched to sandwiches,“ says Valida Mendonca, a final year student of radiation therapy in Manipal, a university town that is home to nearly 11,000 students from around the world. Anant A, a civil engineering student at the Manipal Insitute of Technology , said that several of his friends had bought sandwich makers following the Maggi ban. “Since we study late into the night, some light snacks or food is necessary to keep us awake,“ he says.
Information from online grocer Bigbasket appeared to corroborate this trend. On a request from TOI, the e-tailer did some data crunching of 500 big Maggi consuming households. The analysis found that bread and eggs were among the three items that saw an increase during the period for those customers who sharply reduced their purchase of Maggi and similar products. The third item was fruits.
With Maggi now back in stores in some states, will the growth in these other products slow down? “It might be tough for Maggi to grow the overall noodles category sales to the level that existed before the ban during this calendar year,“ said Hari Menon, co-founder & CEO of Bigbasket.