This week (2 November) Young’s took its best-selling battered fish brand, Chip Shop, to Parliament - highlighting for MPs the work done in recent years to reformulate it as a healthier product.

Young’s appeared alongside a number of other famous British food brands at an event hosted by the Food and Drink Manufacturing All Party Parliamentary Group together with the Food and Drink Federation (FDF).

The session allowed MPs to meet food manufacturers to discuss the challenges and opportunities of making health improvements to popular food and drink products.

Young’s set out in 2005 with the aim of significantly reducing the saturated fat of Chip Shop – without compromising the traditional taste and texture which have made it so successful. After more than 100 product trials and extensive consumer research, Chip Shop was re-launched in 2007 with a ‘less than 5% saturated fat’ proposition. Supported by advertising to emphasise its healthier positioning, sales of Chip Shop have grown by 18% since it was relaunched.

Charlotte Broughton, marketing controller at Young’s, says, “This was a great opportunity for us to meet MPs and showcase one of our key nutrition improvement projects. Traditional battered fish is not usually regarded as a healthy food, but reducing the fat in Chip Shop to less than 5% means it can now be enjoyed by everyone as part of a healthy diet.”

Young’s ongoing nutritional improvement programme has also reduced saturated fat in its classic breaded Scampi by 75% - taking the product to just 1.3% saturated fat. Further product improvement work continues across the Young’s range.

A full case study regarding Young’s Chip Shop (and other major food brands) can be found in the FDF’s Recipe for Change report.