Portillo's Is Ridiculous

doubleloop23
doubleloop23 Posts: 86
edited September 19 in Food and Nutrition
So when I emailed Portillo's about the nutritional value of their cheeseburger this is what I got back...

"Thank you for your E-mail. The requirement to provide nutritional information is a constantly changing area of government regulations. At the current time, state and federal law requires labeling of those items sold as retail grocery. Items sold at restaurants are exempt.
We continue to watch this area so we can remain in compliance. However, at this time, the information you seek is unavailable and we are unable to comply with your request. Portillo's is a privately held business, with a limited number of stores. We do not franchise our restaurants. The cost of testing to obtain nutritional information and keeping such information current and correct is prohibitive. While we manufacture some of our products, we source many products from multiple suppliers with varying specifications. This fluctuation in purchasing would create the need for prolonged and repeated testing making it extremely difficult to generate a concise and accurate report on the nutritional values of all of our menu items. We appreciate having the opportunity to explain."


Really?! And people wonder why America is the "heaviest" country... It's because restaurants like this refuse to provide information to the public:grumble:

It seems to be one of those if-you-have-to-ask-its-not-a-good-sign things

Thanks for letting me vent...

P.S. And people wonder why there aren't restaurants like this outside of the United States

Replies

  • maurierose
    maurierose Posts: 574 Member
    ROFLMAO - kinda.... that is similar to the email I received when I emailed John's Incredible Pizza... will have to find it and post here. What a lazy, ridiculous excuse!
  • adopt4
    adopt4 Posts: 970 Member
    Also makes you wonder what crap they are putting in there with additives and such, if they dont' want to even begin to tell people???
  • xXmimiXx
    xXmimiXx Posts: 564 Member
    Yeh! OMG! I'm in England and restaurants are slowly slowly having to provide nutritional information especially places like McDonalds etc they're actually really good now but I wouldn't eat anywhere who responded to me like that. If they had nothing to hide they'd surely want people to know the nutritional values so that people like us would eat there but just flat out refusing...must be some dodgy chemicals and high fat percentages in there! Yeeeeeeeeeeugh!
  • ClarkOMan
    ClarkOMan Posts: 54 Member
    "It's people. Soylent Green is made out of people. They're making our food out of people. Next thing they'll be breeding us like cattle for food. You've gotta tell them. You've gotta tell them! "
  • erikazj
    erikazj Posts: 2,365 Member
    I've had similar responses from places in the UK - major chains that can't provide nutritional info. Wagamama's and Zizzi's just to name two.

    Erika
  • ryvin
    ryvin Posts: 7
    They really don't want you to know how much sugar, fat, and processed materials really go into your food for fear you wont eat it anymore and they would have to switch to natural more expensive ingredients (god forbid!). They are all scared about their profit margin.
  • marm1962
    marm1962 Posts: 950 Member
    "It's people. Soylent Green is made out of people. They're making our food out of people. Next thing they'll be breeding us like cattle for food. You've gotta tell them. You've gotta tell them! "

    Loved that movie!!
  • mommared53
    mommared53 Posts: 9,543 Member
    I saw that movie years ago. Freaked me out! The thing that really stuck with me is that they made food out of people. :noway: :sick:
  • iRun4wine
    iRun4wine Posts: 5,126
    There aren't a whole lot of issues that I feel strongly about, but I think it should be illegal for restaurants to not provide nutrition information. For some people (most people, actually) nutrition information is a luxury- a tool to help us eat within our calories and reach our health goals. However, for some nutrition information is not a luxury- it's required information. Some people need to keep an incredibly close eye on their caloric, fat, sodium, potassium, etc. consumption for the day, and I think that restaurants should HAVE to provide it. :explode:

    Just my two cents, I guess...

    Edited to include:
    I would LOVE to see a local news station do a feature on which restaurants do NOT provide this information, and offer some possible reasons why... I think a little bit of not-so-positive publicity (especially during this economy) would cause some of those restaurants to re-think their "policies" aka what they keep secret (or what they don't even have a clue about)
  • marm1962
    marm1962 Posts: 950 Member
    So when I emailed Portillo's about the nutritional value of their cheeseburger this is what I got back...

    "Thank you for your E-mail. The requirement to provide nutritional information is a constantly changing area of government regulations. At the current time, state and federal law requires labeling of those items sold as retail grocery. Items sold at restaurants are exempt.
    We continue to watch this area so we can remain in compliance. However, at this time, the information you seek is unavailable and we are unable to comply with your request. Portillo's is a privately held business, with a limited number of stores. We do not franchise our restaurants. The cost of testing to obtain nutritional information and keeping such information current and correct is prohibitive. While we manufacture some of our products, we source many products from multiple suppliers with varying specifications. This fluctuation in purchasing would create the need for prolonged and repeated testing making it extremely difficult to generate a concise and accurate report on the nutritional values of all of our menu items. We appreciate having the opportunity to explain."


    Really?! And people wonder why America is the "heaviest" country... It's because restaurants like this refuse to provide information to the public:grumble:

    It seems to be one of those if-you-have-to-ask-its-not-a-good-sign things

    Thanks for letting me vent...

    P.S. And people wonder why there aren't restaurants like this outside of the United States

    Here is an example of what it cost to get nutritional value of food..........Keep in mind that this is per item, not the whole dish, for examplethe cheeseburger......I don't know what was on it but we know that it would be at least 3 items......the burger, the cheese, the bun. Full nutritional info for EACH item is approximately $150 -$300. So for that plain cheeseburger it would cost from $450 - $900. That's not much for a national chain making millions, but for the smaller businesses it's a killer. (no I don't own a food business.)

    http://www.adecron.co.nz/ftc_labelnutr.html

    http://www.cspinet.org/new/pdf/myth_vs._reality.pdf. (Their $18,000 is not right)
  • malsabor
    malsabor Posts: 3
    Yall amuse me. What's even more ridiculous is that yall won't take your lazy selves and figure out the nutritional value of the foods you eat there yourselves....... BUT want to call them lazy. They are not responsible for what you put in your mouth - YOU ARE. If you are tooooooo lazy to figure out yourself, by all means DON'T eat there. If you were really trying to lose weight you would be well aware by now that cooking your own food is the only way to control the ingredients and fat content.

    America is the "heaviest" country because its citizens feel soooo entitled that everything has to be done for them. So much so that they can't be bother to put forth the minimal effort to research the content of their foods on their own.
    (I mean, after all, common sense would derive that heavy people are heavy from lack of movement right... wouldn't this be proof of that refusal to move?)
  • malsabor
    malsabor Posts: 3
    I
  • malsabor
    malsabor Posts: 3
    There aren't a whole lot of issues that I feel strongly about, but I think it should be illegal for restaurants to not provide nutrition information. For some people (most people, actually) nutrition information is a luxury- a tool to help us eat within our calories and reach our health goals. However, for some nutrition information is not a luxury- it's required information. Some people need to keep an incredibly close eye on their caloric, fat, sodium, potassium, etc. consumption for the day, and I think that restaurants should HAVE to provide it. :explode:

    Just my two cents, I guess...

    Edited to include:
    I would LOVE to see a local news station do a feature on which restaurants do NOT provide this information, and offer some possible reasons why... I think a little bit of not-so-positive publicity (especially during this economy) would cause some of those restaurants to re-think their "policies" aka what they keep secret (or what they don't even have a clue about)

    I think it should be illegal for people to eat out for more than one night a week. Since its bad for the environment. Where's my news special?
This discussion has been closed.

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