USDA Food Guide Pyramid
The US Department of Agriculture's graphic for the Dietary Guidelines, showing daily food-group servings as a pyramid. NCI's Pink Book uses it as its main example of pretesting that changed a design: testing chose the pyramid over a bowl and other shapes, and replaced food icons that people misread.
- Years
- 1992–2005
- Country
- United States
- Topic
- Nutrition
- Asks people to
- Start
- Strategy
- Brand symbolSimple instruction
- Channel
- PackagingPrint
- Audience
- General public
Evidence
NoneUnknown
No outcome evaluation in the Pink Book. Its pretest account (p. 80): 'extensive pretesting' found the pyramid shape communicated better than a bowl and other shapes; icons for fats and sugars (salad dressing, a soda can, a sugar bowl) were misunderstood, and replacing them with butter, an oil droplet and a sugar spoon 'improved comprehension'.
Sponsor (who paid)
- US Department of Agriculture Federal government
Credits (who made it)
Not recorded yet.
Sources
Research notes
Created 2026-10-23 from a full reading of the Pink Book (docs/pink-book.md, issue #43). Page numbers are the book's printed pages. Years 1992 (release) and 2005 (replaced by MyPyramid) are from general knowledge, not from the book; check against USDA's history pages. The pyramid's design history was controversial (industry lobbying over food-group placement); not covered here.
Record cases/usda-food-guide-pyramid.json, updated 2026-10-23· Link to this campaign