‘The best’? ‘Sell by’? A new California law eliminates food label confusion
You decided to make a sandwich and get your bread, but the “sell by” date on the bag has passed. You throw it in the trash to make a mistake, even though you’re not sure if it means the bread has passed its expiration date.
A new California law would cut the laundry list of food date labels on produce in half, ending consumer confusion and stopping the resulting unintended food waste.
There are more than 50 different food date labels in the United States, according to a report published by researchers at the University of Maryland.
Here are just a few phrases you may have seen in your diet:
- Use with
- The best with
- Expires on
- Please enjoy
Each phrase can convey a different message about a food product.
Some date labels are designed to assist store clerks with inventory management. Most label dates, however, are used by food packaging companies to tell the consumer how long a product will last at its best, said Andrea Collins, senior food waste expert for the Natural Resources Defense Council, a US-based nonprofit that focuses on international environmental policies. Few labels are intended to tell the consumer that there is an increased risk of foodborne illness over time.
These explanations have not been passed on to consumers, who, in their confusion, unwittingly contribute to food waste by discarding food they believe to be spoiled.
A 2025 national survey conducted by Harvard Law School, John Hopkins and ReFED, a non-profit organization based in the US that works to solve food waste, found that of more than 2,000 respondents, on average, 87% believed they knew the meanings of eight different labels, but when asked, only 53% answered correctly.
Nationally, the survey found that 43% of respondents regularly or routinely throw away food near or past the label date, up from 37% in 2016.
Californians throw away 2.5 billion dollars worth of non-perishable food each year, which accounts for about 48% of what residents send to landfills, according to the Department of Recycling and Recovery Services, or CalRecyle.
“As organic waste decomposes in landfills, it accounts for 41% of the state’s methane emissions, a greenhouse gas that is 84 times more climate-warming than carbon dioxide,” according to CalRecycle.
Waste also affects consumers’ wallets when food is thrown away quickly.
To eliminate the ambiguity and resulting food waste, Assembly Bill 660 was signed into law and will take effect on July 1, which will eventually reduce the phrases allowed on packages to just two.
What AB 660 would do
The bill requires food manufacturers to use only two food date labels to mark the quality or safety of a food product in the state of California.
The two sentences are:
- “Best if Used” or “Best if Used or Best Before,” indicating the freshness, or quality, of a food item.
- “Use by” or “Use by or Freeze,” indicating when the food is no longer safe to eat.
Starting next month, the law will prohibit the sale of any food product without a label with any phrase — this applies to products produced on or after July 1, 2026. So you might see a few different phrases on food products that were already on the shelves or in the retailer’s stock.
It also prohibits the use of a “sell by” date on food packaging, but allows coded “sell by” dates that retain stock change information for retailers.
Why did California previously have so many food day labels?
It is a common misconception that the federal government regulates meal days. Except for baby formula, not so much, Collins said.
The United States is one of the few countries that doesn’t have a federal road map for federal food labels, “so that doesn’t mean every country is doing it right, but they all have something,” said Emily Broad Leib, professor of medical law and director of the Harvard Law School Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation.
Beginning in the late 1950s and rapidly in the 1970s, several states passed laws requiring a date label on certain foods. But that effort didn’t set national standards for what it meant or what the language was, Broad Leib said.
At the time, the focus of the label was on freshness or how long the food product had been on the shelf.
Over time, most consumers have interpreted those as safety dates, so we have this real discrepancy. [of interpretation],” said Broad Leib.
Who enforces Assembly Bill 660
The primary responsibility for enforcement of Assembly Bill 660, which amends the California Food Code, lies with local law, said a spokesperson for the California Department of Public Health.
“The California Retail Food Code establishes health and sanitation standards for retail food establishments, which are enforced by local health agencies during routine inspections,” according to the state agency.
That means the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, which is the local agency that enforces these requirements in the county, will be in charge of monitoring whether businesses are following the law.
When a violation is observed “during a routine inspection or complaint investigation, it will be noted in the facility’s Official Inspection Report, and appropriate action will be taken by Public Health,” the Los Angeles Department of Public Health told The Times in an email.
Broad Leib said he strongly believes the law is a step in the right direction.
“We should have only two labels, it should be clear which one is for safety and which one is for quality, so that they don’t buy.” [in California] they can make better economic and security decisions,” he said.
It’s not yet clear what kind of training local health inspectors receive to not only stop potential violators, but also to see which businesses are best using two labels for a given product, Broad Leib said.
“It would be something that should be looked at or the future, maybe, a state-level guideline on how they should do this testing,” he said. “Or guidance to businesses about making a decision about which label to use.”
