A brand or a sticker on a product seems to be all the validation needed for consumer satisfaction: new and improved, organic, trans-fat free, ecofriendly. It is what it is, except when it isn’t. Labels and packaging are there to inform, warn and guide the consumer, but sometimes all they do is confuse.

And who wants trickery when it comes to such finery as caviar? The choices used to be beluga, osetra and sevruga. But beluga has been banned in America, and the harvest of wild osetra and sevruga from the Caspian and Black Seas for the international market was halted. Instead, six sturgeon species are farmed , and the differences among them are not clear, said The Times.

“Some dealers are taking advantage of the confusion, and perhaps adding to it, by labeling many of the new farmed caviars ‘osetra,’ ” The Times reported.

The packaging on Zwyer caviar says that it is oscietra (a spelling for osetra) and uses the motto “The Caspian Legacy.” Yet the fine print says it contains roe from Siberian baerii raised in Uruguay. The company says that baerii is “a kind of osetra”; others disagree.

Also in the realm of legal but confusing is the marketing of “light” cigarettes. By June, under the new federal tobacco law in America, companies cannot use words like “light” or “mild” on packages to imply that some cigarettes are safer than others. Instead, tobacco companies all over the world are using light colored packaging for light cigarettes, The Times reported. R.J. Reynolds has already changed Salem Ultra Lights, sold in a silver box, to Silver Box.

“They’re using color coding to perpetuate one of the biggest health myths into the next century,” Gregory N. Connolly, a professor at Harvard School of Public Health, told The Times.

Companies say they are using colors to identify different packs and tastes . But studies have shown consumers believe that the terms and colors mean a safer product, The Times reported.

From caviar to cigarettes to calories, there’s a lack of clarity. The serving sizes on many packaged foods are too small, making their calorie counts misleading, wrote The Times. The Food and Drug Administration is trying to change that. For ice cream, the serving size on the carton is half a cup. For packaged muffins, it’s often half a muffin. But people eat more than that.

“To consumers, the serving size appears to be inconsistent and intuitive,” Wendy Reinhardt Kapsak, senior director of health and wellness at the International Food Information Council Foundation, told The Times. “They have trouble trusting it.”

Garnering trust is often what drives a brand, and pharmaceutical companies are doing just that. Drug companies are getting into the generics market in emerging economies in Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America, where many are willing to pay a premium for generics from wellknown makers. These branded generics are seen as a sign of authenticity and quality control, wrote The Times, especially in countries where fears of low-quality medicines run high. Giants like Sanofi-Aventis and GlaxoSmithKline are buying generic makers and putting their name on packages, in effect telling consumers: “You can trust us.”

But with brand saturation and all the fine print, trust is a fickle partner. Like the designer Norma Kamali said, “The idea of branding, we have to rethink that. Sometimes a label only gets in the way.”


ANITA PATIL


Calorie counts and serving sizes on many packages can mislead the consumer who eats more. / PAUL SAKUMA/ASSOCIATED PRESS