Customization of food products has increased substantially in recent years while the desire for healthiness and an emphasis on understanding and providing calorie information continues to dynamically change the landscape of restaurant retail. The authors report four studies demonstrating that different customization routes (i.e., rejecting alternatives from a full product offering versus adding alternatives to a basic product offering) lead to systematic, but predictable, differences in consumers’ estimations of calories. In particular, this research finds that a rejection (vs. selection) customization process leads consumers to persistently estimate lower calories in the final product, which then improves evaluations of the retailer and leads to unhealthier food choices. These findings occur when consumers estimate calories of the exact same final product using the different paths to customization as well as when they create their own customized final product, while accounting for differences in the quantity and type of ingredients selected, suggesting a very general difference in estimations. This research has important implications for consumers who want to manage their weight and for firms that need to manage consumers’ health perceptions.

近年来，食品的定制化大幅增加，而对健康的渴望以及对了解和提供卡路里信息的重视继续动态地改变餐厅零售的格局。作者报告了四项研究，表明不同的定制路线（即拒绝完整产品中的替代品与向基本产品中添加替代品）导致消费者对卡路里估计的系统性但可预测的差异。特别是，这项研究发现拒绝（与选择）定制过程会导致消费者持续估计最终产品中的卡路里含量较低，从而改善对零售商的评估并导致选择不健康的食物。当消费者使用不同的定制路径估计完全相同的最终产品的卡路里时，以及当他们创建自己的定制最终产品时，就会出现这些发现，同时考虑到所选成分的数量和类型的差异，这表明两者之间存在非常普遍的差异。估计。这项研究对想要控制体重的消费者和需要管理消费者健康观念的公司具有重要意义。