I have to admit to being very frustrated with JetBlue. Part of the problem is missed expectations. When I flew JetBlue a few years ago, I was impressed. They were a value priced airline with perks. JetBlue had good service, high quality cabin snacks, free seat-back video, and convenient airports. I flew them from IAD to Long Beach on quite a few occasions.
The last couple of days my experience has been very different. Delays on both legs of a round trip to Boston. Bait and switch pricing on their web site. Seat back video that didn't work. Extreme nickel and dime up-charges for everything. And lousy, unhealthy cabin snacks instead of the nice high quality Terra Chips that I remembered.
I am only focused in this blog post on their "Fancy Nut Mix" cabin snack. I will start with the Nutritious claim on the bag (Gourmet & Nutritious). As seen in the photo below, the bag contains 14g of fat out of 28g (50%) and 8g out of 28g carbohydrates (28%). So 78% of the package is fat or carbs, and only 18% is protein. Bacon is healthier, at 42% fat and 37% protein (reference here).
Nutritional Information
The main label on the bag of Fancy Nut Mix shown below is very misleading, and the fine print ("A premium blend of Almonds, Cashews and Honey Roasted Sesame Sticks") is only a little better. From the labeling I would expect bag of nuts, and even if I read the fine print I would expect mostly nuts. Not so.
Package Labeling
I weighed the contents of two bags together to try and correct for a single bag outlier. The weight of the two bags together was 57g, almost exactly what it should be. However, the sesame sticks constitute slightly over half the total contents by weight (30g out of 57g, or 53%). A more accurate title on the package would be sesame stick and nut mix.
Total Weight of Contents of Two Bags of Fancy Nut Mix
Sesame Sticks Contained in Two Packages of Fancy Nut Mix
Even more misleading is the official ingredients label. It lists almonds as the first ingredient, and sesame sticks as the second. These labels are required to list ingredients in order by their proportion in the overall contents. So, by listing almonds first, they should make up the highest proportion of all the ingredients in the bag. Not close.
Ingredients in Fancy Nut Mix
Almonds Contained in Two Bags of Fancy Nut Mix
Sesame sticks are 30g, or 53% of the total and Almonds are 19g out of a total weight of 57g, or 33% of the total. Almonds and cashew nuts IN TOTAL are not the primary ingredient in the bag. Listing almonds as the primary ingredient is not even close to correct.
So, JetBlue is handing out snacks that are labeled in ways that are both misleading and factually incorrect. I know a single cabin snack is probably a silly reflection on an airline, but my experience this week with JetBlue was a big let down after my earlier experience and my current expectations.