Guiding Stars® Launches “Food Finder,” an Online Smart Tool to Help Shoppers Identify and Make More Nutritious Food Choices

SCARBOROUGH, Maine--(BUSINESS WIRE)--With healthier eating a top priority for many Americans, Guiding Stars–the world’s first storewide nutrition guidance program–and Wellness Layers announced the public beta release of a new search engine called the “Food Finder.” This nutrition guidance tool is available on Guiding Stars’ website, and will allow shoppers to search more than 50,000 foods in the Guiding Stars database. The “Food Finder” will be the first tool available that provides UPC-level Guiding Stars ratings to consumers.

“Food selection for most of us is done mainly at the local grocery store. By providing consumers with an easy guidance program in-store and tying that into an easy-to-follow online nutrition guidance program, we are bridging an important gap”

With “Food Finder,” consumers can review the products’ nutrition facts label, ingredients information, category, health claims and food allergens. This new tool will allow consumers to immediately identify the more nutritious foods within a category, to compare products, and to comment on products. The web platform developed by Wellness Layers encourages consumers to exchange ideas and share ratings through an online community supporting the “Food Finder.”

“Food selection for most of us is done mainly at the local grocery store. By providing consumers with an easy guidance program in-store and tying that into an easy-to-follow online nutrition guidance program, we are bridging an important gap,” said Jeremy Nobel, MD, MPH, of the Harvard School of Public Health and member of Guiding Stars Scientific Advisory Panel. “This new tool will offer the first easy, comprehensive nutrition guidance to consumers while they plan their food purchases. This is a true turning point and will empower consumers to easily identify more nutritious foods and, in turn, lead to a healthier lifestyle.”

The second phase of the partnership will occur later this year and will focus on the development of a customizable and licensable web tool called “The Smart Shopping Planner.” The Smart Shopping Planner will be a fully featured food shopping tool that can be customized with the brand identity and unique requirements of each participating partner. The tool will reside as a portal on each partner’s website, with a smart shopping function and an integrated meal planner that will allow visitors to create shopping lists and then print, e-mail, or download them to a mobile application. In addition to providing information about making healthier food choices, other topics will include medical condition-related alerts, shopping on a budget and weight loss.

“Our partnership with Guiding Stars is paving the way for busy consumers to more easily integrate balanced nutrition into their healthy lifestyles,” said Amir Kishon, PhD, CEO of Wellness Layers. “The user-friendly Guiding Stars system, combined with our award-winning platform, will offer the first shopping list that is tightly integrated with personal nutrition planning to provide 360 degree nutrition guidance to consumers.”

Guiding Stars rates all edible products in the store – regardless of price, brand, or manufacturer, and utilizes an evidence-based algorithm that is grounded in the most current dietary guidelines and recommendations of leading national and international health organizations, such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Health & Human Services, the National Academy of Sciences, and the World Health Organization. The more nutritional value a food has, the more Guiding Stars it receives on a scale of zero to three. One Guiding Star indicates good nutritional value; two Guiding Stars, better nutritional value; three Guiding Stars, the best nutritional value.

About Guiding Stars Licensing Co.

Since 2006, Guiding Stars has been leading the way in helping consumers make nutritious food choices. The Guiding Stars nutrition guidance program is a simple, easy-to-understand tool for making good nutrition choices and is designed to make a positive and lasting impact on public health. Guiding Stars is currently in more than 1,600 supermarkets including Food Lion, Hannaford, Bloom, Sweetbay, Homeland, and Kings Super Market. Guiding Stars has also expanded into public schools, colleges and hospitals, and appears on the Shopper mobile iPhone application. Additional information can be found at www.guidingstars.com.

About Wellness Layers, Inc.

Wellness Layers is a leading provider of online and mobile customer and patient portals creating deeper online engagement for healthier lifestyles. The Wellness Layers platform includes a complete suite of personal health and wellness applications, social health networks, and personalized content delivery systems specifically honed for the special needs of health and wellness companies. The deeper engagement achieved with the Wellness Layers Platform supports their clients’ efforts for prevention, adherence, weight loss, condition management, and lifestyle modification. Wellness Layers offers special platform editions for the healthcare, nutrition and diet, fitness, pharmaceutical, employee wellness, and healthy lifestyle / e-commerce markets. Additional information can be found at www.wellness-layers.com.