Private Label Is the New Health Brand: What the Data Means for Retailers and Manufacturers

TL;DR:
Consumers have decided: private label is just as healthy as name brands. Mintel’s 2025 Better For You Eating Trends research shows that 63% of consumers view store brand food and drink as just as healthy as name brand, and 58% see private label as the same quality. At the same time, 40% say cost of living has made maintaining healthy behaviors difficult — driving value-seeking consumers directly to private label. The opportunity for retailers is massive. But capturing it at scale requires product lifecycle management that can handle hundreds of SKUs, multi-supplier coordination, and regulatory compliance across categories.

Why Are Consumers Choosing Private Label for Health?  

The perception gap between private label and name brand has closed — and the data is unambiguous. 63% of consumers view store brand food and drink as just as healthy as name brand products. 58% see store brands as the same quality. These are not marginal perceptions — they represent a majority of consumers who see no meaningful health or quality distinction between a retailer’s own brand and the national brand next to it on shelf.

The economic context is accelerating this shift. 40% of consumers say cost of living has made maintaining healthy behaviors difficult. When healthy eating feels expensive, consumers do not abandon health — they find more affordable ways to pursue it. Private label is the answer: the same perceived health value at a lower price point. Among those not increasing diet effort, 26% cite cost as the barrier. Private label is how retailers remove that barrier.

Retailers are responding to this signal. Walmart launched bettergoods — its largest private label brand in 20 years, with most products priced under $5 — explicitly targeting the health-conscious, value-seeking consumer. This is not an isolated move. It reflects a structural shift in retail strategy: private label is no longer the budget alternative. It is the health brand.

What Does Scaling BFY Private Label Require from Retailers? 

Launching a single private label product is manageable. Launching a portfolio of hundreds of BFY private label SKUs across categories — snacks, dairy, beverages, frozen, bakery, prepared foods — is an infrastructure challenge that tests every part of the retailer’s product development and supply chain operations. 

Multi-supplier coordination. Private label products are typically manufactured by third-party suppliers, each with different formulation capabilities, different quality standards, and different compliance levels. A retailer managing 50 BFY private label products across 20 suppliers needs visibility into every formulation, every ingredient source, and every specification — not just at launch, but continuously. 

Specification management at scale. Every private label product has a specification that defines what the retailer expects: ingredient composition, nutritional targets, allergen management, packaging requirements, and labeling standards. As private label industry data and trends from the PLMA documents, the specification is the contract between retailer and supplier. When specifications are managed in spreadsheets and email, discrepancies between what was specified and what was produced are discovered at quality control — or worse, on shelf. 

Regulatory compliance across categories. A BFY private label portfolio spans regulatory domains: food safety regulations for private label apply differently to fresh products than to shelf-stable ones, nutritional claims vary by category, and allergen requirements differ by product type. Retailers need compliance requirements for private label products built into the product development process, not managed as a separate workstream. As food retail and supply chain research from FMI highlights, the integration of compliance into retail product management is becoming a competitive necessity. 

How Does PLM Enable Retailers and Manufacturers to Capture the Private Label Health Opportunity? 

The private label health opportunity is a PLM challenge from both sides of the retailer-manufacturer relationship. 

For retailers: PLM software for retail private label provides the infrastructure to manage specifications, coordinate suppliers, and maintain compliance across hundreds of SKUs. When a retailer decides to reformulate its private label granola line for higher protein and lower sugar — responding to the same reformulation demands on F&B manufacturers that Mintel’s data drives — PLM ensures that specifications are updated, suppliers are notified, compliance is validated, and labels reflect the new formulation, all within a single system. 

For manufacturers supplying private label: PLM for food and beverage enables manufacturers to manage multiple retailer specifications simultaneously, maintain formulation traceability across private label contracts, and ensure that products meet each retailer’s specific quality and compliance requirements. When a manufacturer produces the same base product for three retailers with different labeling requirements, different nutritional targets, and different quality standards, PLM is what makes that manageable without tripling the coordination effort. 

As CIMdata on PLM for brand integrity and agility confirms, the retailers and manufacturers who integrate product lifecycle management into their private label operations are the ones positioned to scale BFY private label at the speed the market demands. The consumer has already decided that private label is just as healthy. The question is whether the infrastructure exists to deliver on that expectation across hundreds of SKUs, dozens of suppliers, and multiple regulatory jurisdictions. 

Frequently Asked Questions 

Consumers see private label as the health brand. Can your infrastructure deliver at scale?
See how PLM software for retail private label and PLM for food and beverage enable retailers and manufacturers to scale BFY private label with integrated specification management, supplier coordination, and compliance. 

About Trace One

With more than 30 years of industry expertise, Trace One partners with over 9,000 brands across food and beverage, cosmetics, and chemicals to accelerate product development and turn regulatory complexity into a competitive advantage. Our AI-powered PLM platform, with regulatory intelligence spanning 170+ countries, supports the entire product manufacturing lifecycle — helping brands bring market-leading products to shelf faster and thrive in new markets. Learn more at traceone.com.