General Mills prevails in use of claim 'Now Even Better'

A national advertising self-regulatory group said Wednesday that Golden Valley-based General Mills Inc. can support the "Now Even Better" claim for reformulated varieties of its Progresso Light soup -- a claim challenged by archrival Campbell Soup Co.

Campbell had argued that "Now Even Better" was an "unsubstantiated comparative superiority claim," and that consumers could infer that General Mills was comparing its new light soups to prior versions of the product, or to a competitive soup brand.

General Mills attested that "Now Even Better" did compare retooled soups to a previous Progresso light line and that the company had indeed improved the product. That included increasing the size of chicken pieces in some versions and upping the amount of vegetables in others.

The National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureaus determined that the "clear, plain meaning of the phrase 'Now Even Better'" was a reference to previous versions of Progresso Light and that General Mills had provided sufficient evidence to support its claim.