Nutri-Score and snacks for 3-6 year olds: what parents actually do in the aisle

The Nutri-Score has been displayed in France since 2017 and awareness is very high. Yet most packaged children's snacks are rated C, D or E, and little is known about how much the label really weighs when a parent shops for a child aged 3 to 6, an age when food preferences take shape.

How do parents trade off the Nutri-Score, price, their children's requests and their own values in the snack aisle? And what place does the label really hold in the final decision?

I carried out the whole study: framing, literature review, interview guide design, recruitment, conducting and transcribing interviews, analysis and writing.

• Literature review on nutrition labelling, consumer decision-making and children's food socialisation.
• Five exploratory working hypotheses.
• Diversified sample of 13 parents of children aged 3 to 6 in France (income, purchase frequency, family context).
• Semi-structured guide piloted on two preliminary interviews, then refined during fieldwork.
• Phone interviews conducted between January and July 2025, fully transcribed.
• Inductive thematic coding, then a typology and a decision model.

• A research thesis of about 70 pages.
• A typology of 5 parent profiles.
• A 7-step model of decisions in the snack aisle.
• An influence matrix of 6 factors by profile.
• Recommendations for brands, retailers and public health actors.

• Every parent knows the Nutri-Score, but the gap between stated support and real influence on purchases is systematic.
• The label often works less as a buying guide than as a marker of "good parenting" and a way to ease guilt.
• Five forces compete with it: the child's wishes, price, cultural cues (organic, natural, homemade), mental load and family values.
• The child is a real co-decision-maker, even when not in the store. Snack time is also a moment of family peace.
• For brands: target both audiences (nutritional quality for parents, enjoyment for children), reformulate transparently, and speak to the relational side of snack time.
• Thesis defended in June 2026.