Chocolate Milk Bans Decrease Sales and Increase Waste

School cafeteria bans on chocolate milk decreased sales but generated more waste, according to a recent study.

"Students take 10 percent less milk, waste 29 percent more and may even stop eating school meals," co-author Andrew Hanks said in a news release.

The article, published in the journal Plos ONE, describes results after researchers collected data from 11 Oregon elementary schools. These schools prohibited the chocolatey deliciousness and replaced it with skim milk in the hope that it would decrease kids' sugar intake.

To the researchers' surprise, the new Cornell Food and Brand Lab study showed that eliminating chocolate milk from elementary schools reduced sales by 10 percent, indicating that many students substituted white for chocolate milk. And even though kids were choosing the skim milk, the switch created 29 percent more waste than before.

Although the goal was simply to prevent students from consuming too much sugar, the study observed some nutritional backlash. Students on average consumed less sugar and fewer calories, but also consumed less protein and calcium.

Also, the ban may explain the 7 percent drop in District's Lunch Program participation.

"I wouldn't recommend banning flavored milk unless you have a comprehensive plan in place to compensate for the lost nutrients when kids stop drinking milk altogether," said Nicole Zammit, former Assistance Director of Nutrition Services at Eugene School District.

The authors offered up several solutions to the problem.

"There are other ways to encourage kids to select white milk without banning the chocolate," co-author and Director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab, Brian Wansink proposes. "Make white milk appear more convenient and more normal to select. Two quick and easy solutions are: Put the white milk in the front of the cooler and make sure that at least 1/3 to 1/2 of all the milk is white."