Asda and Morrisons own-brand fruit and fibre cereal actually produced by Weetabix

A recent recall of cereal has forced Weetabix to reveal that it also produces Asda and Morrisons’ own-brand fruit and fibre cereal.

Plastic fears

The recall was issued by the Weetabix group on May 31 and affected Asda fruit and fibre and Morrison fruit and fibre cereals.

The products were recalled due to fears that they contained small pieces of plastic, which the Food Standards Agency branded as “unsafe to eat”.

The recall affected 500g boxes with a batch code of 9095 (for both Asda and Morrisons cereal), and a best before date of April 5 2020.

If you have a box of the recalled product, take it back to the shop you purchased it from for a full refund.

Produced by Weetabix?

Weetabix is behind a lot of different brands, including Weetabix, Oatibix, Weetos, Ready Brek and Alpen.

These brands are on the Weetabix website, however it fails to include the fact that it’s also behind various own-brand cereals, including Asda and Morrisons’ own-brand fruit and fibre cereals.

Big brands are often the manufacturers behind supermarket own-brand products, but this is kept from the public for commercial reasons.

Paying extra for a brand

Many own-brand products are also produced by the big-name brand behind the original, but are we paying extra just for a brand name?

The Weetabix fruit and fibre, sold by retailer Poundstretcher, states that the RRP for a 500g pack is £1.99.

The Asda own pack of fruit and fibre cereal for 750g is priced at £1.45.

Morrisons’ own fruit and fibre cereal was priced slightly higher at £1.68 for a 750g pack.

In 2017, The Sun conducted an investigation which revealed some of the household brands that were also behind own-brand products.

Similarly, in 2017 the Daily Mail reported how some own brand products and name brand products differed in price despite being virtually identical.

They reported: “Tesco’s standard UHT semi-skimmed milk is 90p for a litre, while its Everyday Value UHT is 49p per litre. Both brands have the same nutritional value and come from the same plant, according to carton codes.”

This article originally appeared on our sister site Edinburgh Evening News