National Consumers League petitions FDA to take action against four companies that label their products as "100%" lemon juice, saying they actually contain 35% or less lemon juice

Nevin Barich

WASHINGTON , March 27, 2012 (press release) – Lemon juice is a kitchen staple, used in cooking, baking, and flavoring in many recipes, and many cooks opt for the convenience of bottled lemon juice, rather than keeping fresh fruit on hand. Recently, the National Consumers League has discovered that not all bottled lemon juice products are what they claim to be.

In a formal complaint to the Food and Drug Administration this month, NCL is urging the federal agency to stop the sale of four brands of “100%” lemon juice that were recently tested and found to be heavily diluted with water. The four products tested by NCL, each of which contain only a small amount of real lemon juice, are:

* “NaturaLemon 100% Lemon Juice from concentrate – Natural Strength” contains only about 35 percent lemon juice.
* "Lira 100% Lemon Juice from concentrate” contains only about 25 percent lemon juice.
* “Lemon Time Lemon Juice from concentrate” contains about only 15 percent lemon juice. The product states on its front label, “Contains 100% Lemon Juice with added ingredients.”
* “Pampa Lemon Juice from concentrate” contains only about 10 percent lemon juice. The product states “Made with 100% Juice.” The label also includes the statement “Natural Strength.”

Consumer advocates believe that these producers water down their products to lower production costs and increases profits. In the case of lemon juice, recent weather conditions have led to variability in the supply of fresh lemons —and lemons being harder to get has given unscrupulous producers incentive to dilute their products with water and add citric acid and sugars to compensate for flavor.

The label of NaturaLemon illustrates just how bad the problem is. The label indicates that the bottle contains the juice of 30 lemons! However, doing the math, the bottle is likely made with only the juice from 10 lemons. The incentive to cheat is obvious.

NCL has long been an advocate of truthful and honest labeling. Consumers who buy these brands think that they are getting 100 percent lemon juice, but in reality they are not getting what they have paid for. We hope that FDA or state officials will take action to ensure that these brands either clean up their act or are no longer sold in stores. Click here to read NCL’s complaint to FDA and view the laboratory tests we sponsored.

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