Finally, a free Nutrition Facts labeling tool!
A few people have asked me for a software to print Food Nutrition Facts Labels to use in conjunction with Shop’NCook nutritional analysis. I made some research, but couldn’t find a free nutrition facts labeling tool on the internet. As far as I can tell, there isn’t any nutrition facts labeling software at all on the Mac OS X platform and the couple of programs I tried on Windows produced good-looking labels, but they did not follow the complex FDA rules.
To fill this gap, I have written a free tool to make nutrition facts labels. It is easy to use and online, so you don’t need to download anything. Click the button below to get started or continue to read if you want more information.
What does it do?
You input the nutritional values for the different nutrients on the form and it will format them according to the FDA code, section 101.9, that implements the provisions of the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act (NLEA) of 1990.
Update 6 Jan 2008: it implements now also the amendment of July 11, 2003 about trans fat, effective January 1st 2006.
What is the serving size?
FDA rules has strict instructions on selecting the size of a serving. If you are not sure what is the serving size of your product, check the regulations.
What nutrients must be input in the form?
You must input the following compulsory nutrient values:
- total calories
- calories from fat
- total fat
- saturated fat
- trans fat
- cholesterol
- sodium
- total carbohydrate
- dietary fiber
- sugars
- protein
- vitamin A
- vitamin C
- calcium
- iron
Additionally, some voluntary nutrients can be added. The only voluntary nutrient supported at the time being by the form is sugar alcohol. If you need other voluntary components, let me know and I will add them as time allows.
Update 24 March 2009: I have added now support for all the optional vitamins and minerals. To add an optional vitamin or mineral, first select the checkbox “Include optional vitamins or minerals”, then select the checkboxes next to the minerals or vitamins you want to include.
Update 14 June 2009: I have added now support also for polyunsaturated fat, monounsaturated fat and potassium. To add them or sugar alcohol to the label, select “Include voluntary components”, check the boxes next to the components you want to include, and input their values.
What are the voluntary components of the nutrition facts panel?
The voluntary components are:
- calories from saturated fat
- polyunsaturated fat
- monounsaturated fat
- potassium
- soluble fiber
- insoluble fiber
- sugar alcohol (for example, the sugar substitutes xylitol, mannitol and sorbitol)
- other carbohydrate (the difference between total carbohydrate and the sum of dietary fiber, sugars, and sugar alcohol if declared)
- percent of vitamin A present as beta-carotene
- Vitamin D
- Vitamin E
- Vitamin K
- Thiamin
- Riboflavin
- Niacin
- Vitamin B6
- Folate
- Vitamin B12
- Biotin
- Pantothenic acid
- Phosphorus
- Iodine
- Magnesium
- Zinc
- Selenium
- Copper
- Manganese
- Chromium
- Molybdenum
- Chloride
Can the online nutrition facts tool be used for every kind of food?
No, it cannot be used in any of the following three cases:
- If the food is not targeting the general population, but less than 4-year-old children, infants, pregnant or lactating women.
- For meat and poultry products as they are regulated by USDA and are not covered by NLEA.
- If the panel must include some of voluntary components not supported by the script. A voluntary component must be included if you make a claim on your label about it or if the food is enriched by it.
Can I use the nutrition facts tool in Canada (UK, Australia, etc.)?
No, this tool is based only on US nutrition facts panel rules. If there are enough interest, I may add other countries at a later time.
Do you guarantee the nutrition facts tool follows FDA rules?
No. I have done my best to follow the FDA formatting rules to the word, but it is a free tool and I don’t guarantee I didn’t make mistakes. I guarantee however to fix promptly any mistake pointed out to me.
How do I get the nutrient values?
The USDA has a database of nutrient values for a large number of food. You can also use a cooking software like Shop’NCook to compute the nutritional analysis from a recipe.
Can I use the nutrition facts labeling tool directly from Shop’NCook software?
Not yet. If there is enough interest, I will add a function to populate up the form directly from Shop’NCook. If you would like such a function, leave a comment or send me a message.
Anyway, do I need a nutrition facts panel on my products?
If you have a small business and don’t make any health claim on your label, you probably don’t need a nutrition facts panel, but you may have to notify the FDA to be able to claim an exemption. When exempt products carry nutritional information, they must however follow the regulation. For a lot of useful information on this and on the type of claims allowed on a food product label, go here.
Get started now with the free nutrition facts label tool!
September 26th, 2007 at 12:12 am
[…] you ever wanted to know about writing nutrition facts panels… http://www.shopncook.com/blog/?p=11 […]
November 10th, 2007 at 6:11 am
PLEASE MAKE ONE FOR THE CANADIAN NUTRITION FACTS… THIS IS EXCELLENT
November 10th, 2007 at 6:13 am
PLEASE MAKE ONE FOR CANADIAN NUTRITION FACTS… THIS IS EXCELLENT
March 14th, 2008 at 7:25 am
OK, I will do it when I find the time!
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:06 pm
dear Mr,Mathilde
thank you for your article
really it add to me more …. many things i don”t know before
.. but i still have a problem
because i especially work in food industry .. and i need a program to put the content of my new recipe as a quantity in this program
to get the result ready
pls. try to help me
regards .. Moh.
September 8th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Mohammed,
You can download the trial of Shop’NCook Pro at http://www.shopncook.com/pro.html to compute the nutritional information of your recipes. You can then format them with the tool above.
Note however that to get an accurate nutritional analysis, you have to input first into Shop’NCook Pro the nutritional values for the actual ingredients you are using. You should be able to get them from your suppliers. The default values of the database may correspond to an average of similar products or to a different brand and may not be reliable enough for labeling purposes. Also, you may have to adjust also the values for nutritional loss during processing. I will write a post soon about computing nutrition analysis for labeling purpose, stay tuned!
September 22nd, 2008 at 2:27 pm
what type of label peel-off paper can i use. Does avery paper have peel off labels that coordinate with the length of the nutriotional label
November 29th, 2008 at 6:18 am
Hi,
This is a nice piece of WORK!!! THX
Is there any possibility to save the label, in an electronic format (something like bmp, jpg, tiff)?
thx
March 24th, 2009 at 11:06 am
For those we have requested it: I have now added support for the optional minerals and vitamins.
April 3rd, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Is there any way to copy & paste the label so youcan print a sticker page with multiple labels on it?
May 12th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
Could you add Pottassium?
June 12th, 2009 at 5:57 am
This software is really helpful! Thanks for creating it. I am trying to tweak my label to look like others I see out there, and there are two things I’ve noticed:
1) I can’t use a fraction like 1/2 in the serving size. This seems to be the customary format that I see on food labels, rather than the decimal format (0.5) that I have to use with this tool.
2) I can’t put in “about __ ” in the serving slot, as I see on other labels, for a package that doesn’t divide quite evenly into whole servings but has a little left over.
Just a couple of suggested tweaks. Again, thanks for all you’ve done to create and share this software!
June 12th, 2009 at 6:53 am
Alan,
You should try to print the label to pdf (see this post for more info on this). You can then print several on a page with the software Acrobat Reader.
Julian,
Potassium is on my to-do list. As soon as I find the time, I will add it!
Laura,
Thank you for your suggestions! I will make sure to add the option to input fractional serving size and “about” when I have the chance.
June 14th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
[…] More info on the free nutrition facts labeling tool… […]
June 14th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Julian, Laura,
I have added now support for polyunsaturated fat, monounsaturated fat and potassium, as well as the possibility to input “about” and “1/2″ in the serving size field.
July 20th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
I’m about to start a small food business out of my home in California and would like to know if this shopncook sofware will be able to generate a Nutrition Fact label (or info that can be placed on the label) by me just entering the contents of a recipe like fish (the type- salmon for example), poultry (chicken for example), sugar, garlic, table salt, honey, spices (thyme, white pepper for example), etc. Thanks.
August 18th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Keith,
You can compute that nutritional analysis of your recipes with Shop’NCook software. However, I cannot guarantee that the resulting values will be compliant with the NLEA/FSIS regulations.
In particular, at the time being, the software does not take into account nutrient losses due to processing, resulting in a loss of precision of the calculation. I suggest you contact directly the USDA to confirm the requirements.
August 21st, 2009 at 6:00 am
Can you please send me the formula to calculate PERCENTAGE daily value from daily value in grams or milligarms???
September 1st, 2009 at 10:23 pm
Navdeep, the percentages are calculated from the recommended daily value listed in section 101.9 of the FDA code (see the link in the post).
September 4th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
this is very good website. thank you for your kindness to share this. i’m doing the design of label which need nutrition fact on it. now i have information for each product, but my designer said they need nutrition fact panel of each product to be saved in word file, so they can just copy and paste to each label (they design by using photoshop/AI. Please suggest how we can do this. thank you for your prompt reply.
September 5th, 2009 at 4:40 am
Jeed, first print the label to pdf. You can after convert the pdf file to Word format. If you search on Google for “pdf to doc”, you will find a number of free solutions to do that.
September 7th, 2009 at 4:57 am
Thank you for your prompt reply. One more question. Is that true that Nutrition Fact was used only for food exported to USA and Canada while another countries used “Nutrition Information”. Please help me again on this matter. Thank you very much. JEED
December 28th, 2009 at 7:51 pm
This is a great tool!, can you please make Canadian ones too?
Thanks
January 11th, 2010 at 1:20 am
I’m looking for recipe software with cost and label. Would be very interested in function to populate nutrition form directly from Shop’NCook.
January 11th, 2010 at 7:21 am
Kali,
This function is in consideration for the next release of Shop’NCook Pro. I will let you know when it becomes available.