PowerBar Responds to My Query on Nutrients

Earlier this week I wrote about the change in nutrients I noticed in some new PowerBars that I had ordered.

The calories remained the same, but there was an increase in sodium and a decrease in potassium. I know that these two nutrients work together in our bodies. Also, we all know that when we sweat we lose sodium.

The newer bar is on the bottom

Here is the answer that PowerBar sent me.

Tony,

Thank you for contacting PowerBar®. PowerBar® has been the leader in sports nutrition since 1986 and we want to continue to provide you with the energy as well as the nutritional information to be great, no matter what the challenge.

PowerBar® Performance bars were reformulated a few years ago, and as you mentioned, one of the changes was the increase in sodium. Sodium is an electrolyte lost in sweat. It is important for athletes to replace this electrolyte during exercise in order to prevent hyponatremia (low blood sodium levels). Any changes we have made throughout the years have been based on science for athlete nutritional needs. Nutrients have been altered based on the 2009 position paper of the American College of Sports Medicine.

I am a regular guy not a nutritionist or sports professonal, so I really don’t know what the 2009 position paper from the American College of Sports Medicine said.

I did teach Journalism at the graduate school level, though, and if one of my students responded to a query like this, I would have pointed out that it doesn’t answer the question, it simply raises new ones, like “What did the position paper say?” or, “Did the paper find a new relationship between sodium and potassium that wasn’t reflected in the early PowerBar?”

Anyway, that is how PowerBar chose to respond to our query.  John described it as a boilerplate response. It’s too bad that they couldn’t discern an intelligent question from a consumer and realize it required an intelligent answer, not boilerplate.

For the record, I buy PowerBars by the box and eat them regularly on my bike rides. This second rate response won’t affect my relationship with them as a customer.

Tony