The ketogenic diet has come to considerable prominence in recent years, thanks in part to growing adoption among celebrities, media personalities, and professional athletes. Keto is currently the diet of choice of Katie Couric, Halle Berry, LeBron James, and Tim Tebow. Alicia Vikander famously used the keto diet to lose weight and gain muscle in preparation for her role in “Tomb Raider,” and three out of five Kardashians agree that keto is the way to go.

These influencers are going keto for the diet’s energy-boosting and weight-loss health claims, and what originally started as a medical experiment is now a rapidly growing industry full of new opportunities for functional food and nutritional supplement brands. Data provided to 

 by Innova Market Insights show that the number of new food and beverage products with keto claims grew five-fold from 2013 to 2017, with keto products diversifying from the sports nutrition category into all manner of food and beverage products.

Keto now has a strong presence in the functional foods industry, with keto cereal, keto ice cream, keto candy, and even keto chocolate chip cookies coming to market. Innova’s data indicate that ketogenic sports nutrition products now account for just 33% of the market, down from 100% in 2013. As more mainstream consumers adopt the keto diet, expect ketogenic functional foods to continue expanding into more categories and SKUs.

Keto supplements are also growing, with keto diet adherents frequently using exogenous ketones to reduce the impact of the “keto flu” (ill feelings keto adopters sometimes experience at the start of the diet). Exogenous ketones are now available as ketone esters, ketone salts, and ketone oils.

As more consumers adopt the keto diet to meet their functional needs, expect new opportunities to open up in keto foods and supplements. Here are just a few of the emerging trends that brands and manufacturers will want to watch.

The Ketogenic Trend: Medical Diet Gone Mainstream

 contained the basic principles of what is now known as keto, the modern ketogenic diet came to the fore in the 1920s. Russell Wilder, MD, was an endocrinologist with the Mayo Clinic leading a team of doctors who were developing a new dietary regimen for epilepsy patients.

 Wilder theorized, and later demonstrated through medical trials, that a high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet mimicked the starvation therapy that, at the time, was the leading remedy for severe childhood epilepsy.

 Researchers and clinicians at Johns Hopkins Medicine later built the Ketogenic Diet Center, a clinical and research department dedicated to managing pediatric epilepsy through the ketogenic diet.

In recent years, though, the ketogenic diet has moved outside of the medical establishment and into the mainstream consumer nutrition market. Functional foods, in particular, are seeing rapid growth of foods that are said to promote ketosis (when the body burns fat for energy).

Mike Salguero, co-founder and CEO of ButcherBox (Cambridge, MA), says the ketogenic trend is growing within the functional food space. He points to new product trends in the Paleo market as evidence.

“There’s a Paleo conference in Austin, Texas, every year called PaleoFX,” Salguero says. “I’ve been going there for a few years, and over the past year or so, the conference has really changed. Paleo is moving toward keto. I’m not sure if it’s because the ancestral health experts are realizing keto is more in line with what our ancestors used to eat, but we’re definitely seeing [ketogenic food] products like Fat Bomb and Bulletproof Coffee at these Paleo events.”

Salguero says the ketogenic food trend is similar to the Paleo trend in that both diets are about eating more like our ancestors ate. Functional foods, he says, are big in keto. But one new development he’s witnessed is the advent of exogenous ketones: “The notion that you can drink something and put your body into ketosis, or use it for energy if you’re already on a keto diet? That’s new.”

Ketogenic Supplements Address the “Keto Flu”

Thom King, president and CEO of Icon Foods (Portland, OR), says the keto trend has given rise to demand for a new kind of supplement: a supplement that serves as a shortcut to ketosis. The ketogenic diet, King says, requires its adherents to work harder to stay hydrated, especially in the early stages. Switching to a ketogenic diet also places stress on the body as the body learns to stop burning sugar for fuel and start burning fat. For the first several days of a keto diet, dieters commonly report flu-like symptoms for this reason.

“Staying hydrated is critical, and so is making sure you have plenty of electrolytes,” King says. “That’s why there are more and more keto RTDs and drink mix packets that contain sodium chloride, potassium chloride, and other electrolytes. Many consumers are also looking for shortcuts to get them deeper into ketosis. There are exogenous ketone salts like BHB (beta-hydroxybutyrate), but the most effective supplement by far is exogenous ketone esters.”

Ketogenic supplement brands like Perfect Keto (Austin, TX) offer consumers multiple kinds of supplements that claim to ease the keto flu, ranging from ketone salts to esters to oils. Other brands, like Sated (Cambridge, MA), have formulated such ingredients into ketogenic powders and RTD shakes. Sated founder and CEO Ted Tieken says the keto flu is usually the result of one of two potential causes: either the body is resisting the switch to burning fat instead of sugar, which typically lasts for the first four days of a keto diet, or the consumer is suffering from low electrolytes.

“In the first case, there’s not really much you can do,” Tieken says. “In the second case, many keto brands, Sated included, have incorporated electrolytes into their products.”

The keto industry’s future growth may depend on making consumer transitions to keto diets easier. Expect electrolyte-enriched products and keto flu–busting supplements to continue gaining popularity.

The ketogenic food trend is seeing rapid growth, King says, and popular innovations like fat bombs, ketogenic jerky, and MCT-enriched coffees are all making keto more accessible for the mainstream consumer. To gain mass-market appeal, though, keto brands will have to be prepared to formulate products that stand out.

“The biggest areas of demand right now are ketogenic cereals, condiments, and baked goods,” King explains. “The RTD and powdered drink mix markets are starting to get crowded. ‘Keto-heads’ are going to want food they can’t normally eat if they want to stay in ketosis, like breads, pastas, and potatoes.”

King says brands can stand out in the keto space with clean ingredient formulations and innovative product formats. He also expects pre-made keto-friendly meal products to be a lucrative niche, as “ready-to-eat meals will be the next to pop.”

Dorian Greenow is the founder of Keto-Mojo (Napa, CA), a company that manufactures blood ketone monitoring systems. Greenow says standing out in the keto space will require brands to create a quality product and then attract first adopters to it. The keto industry is a bottom-up one, he says, and leveraging grassroots social media can be a particularly effective strategy.

“Keto is a very tight community of advocates, but when they touch something that resonates, it’s magic,” Greenow says. “The classic example is FBomb,” a keto-friendly line of high-fat, low-carb nut butters and oils. “The formula for success is simple: make a quality product and be real about what you’re offering.”

The ketogenic space is full of opportunity for savvy manufacturers and marketers. Brands entering the keto space can easily capitalize on this growing trend by investing in high-quality ingredients, coming up with innovative new product formats, and building strong communities around their products.

Mike Salguero, co-founder and CEO of ButcherBox, says that tools for tracking and monitoring ketone concentrations is one of the areas where the next major opportunities in keto will arise. Keto dieters tend to move in and out of ketosis, and maintaining the benefits of the ketogenic diet will require these consumers to be able to track blood ketone levels.

“The die-hard ketogenic people say that the only way you know you’re in ketosis is by taking your blood,” Salguero says. “That’s out of the Tim Ferriss [author and podcast host] school of thought where, if you’re going to be on a ketogenic diet, you can’t just eat fat and hope for the best. I think there’s going to be more of this, because more and more people are getting into the biohacking and wearables trends.”

Keto Studies: The Good, the Bad, and the Methodologically Flawed

Dorian Greenow, founder of Keto-Mojo, says one of the threats facing the keto industry is junk science. He says that poorly controlled research on the ketogenic diet has given rise to conflicting conclusions.

 that got pushed out by the Harvard Business Review that said people on a low-carb diet are more likely to die,” Greenow says. “But if you actually read the study, the people who were more likely to die were smokers who were consuming a standard amount of carbs.”

The prospective observational cohort study Greenow references shows that people on low-carb diets are more likely to have a higher BMI, exercise less, smoke more, and have diabetes than those on a high-carb diet. However, as this was an observational study and not a clinical trial, one cannot rule out confounding variables or the directionality problem.

Further and better-controlled research on additional potential applications of the ketogenic diet is needed. Early clinical trials on undersea divers have shown promising evidence that the ketogenic diet may have neuroprotective properties.

 The United States Department of Defense and Duke University are now conducting a randomized blind crossover clinical trial examining the effects of nutritional ketosis on oxygen toxicity in underwater conditions.

The ketogenic diet may have originated within the medical establishment, but there’s still a lot we don’t know about it. Animal studies have shown that the keto diet can reduce brain inflammation and extend lifespan in mice with brain injuries.

 Outside of seizure prevention, though, it’s unknown what long-term effects keto may have in humans. The ketogenic diet is thought to have neuroprotective and anti-inflammatory properties due to its success as a remedy for pediatric epilepsy in the 1920s; however, modern clinical trials on healthy human subjects are few and far between.

 Additionally, the relationship between the ketogenic diet and major side effects like cardiomyopathy is still unknown.

 Further clinical research is needed to determine whether the ketogenic diet is safe for healthy adults as a standard long-term dietary practice.

“Classic Keto.” The Charlie Foundation for Ketogenic Therapies. Accessed online October 2, 2018.

Freeman JM. “Epilepsy’s big fat answer.” 

 (March 2013). Published online March 1, 2013.

“The Ketogenic Diet Center.” Johns Hopkins Medicine. Accessed online October 2, 2018.

Seidelmann SB et al. “Dietary carbohydrate intake and mortality: a prospective cohort study and meta-analysis.” 

 vol. 3, no. 9 (September 2018): E419-E428

Bosco G et al. “Effects of the ketogenic diet in overweight divers breathing enriched air nitrox.” 

Derrick B et al. “Ketogenic diet for reduction of CNS oxygen toxicity in working divers.” NIH Clinical Trial #NCT03433261.	

Shen Y et al. “Bioenergetic state regulates innate inflammatory responses through the transcriptional co-repressor CtBP.” 

Stein V. “As the keto diet gains popularity, scientists explain what we do and don’t know.” University of California San Francisco. Published online August 30, 2018.

Hartman A et al. “Clinical aspects of the ketogenic diet.” 

Articles

Keto products are diversifying from the sports nutrition category into all manner of food and beverage products.

How ketogenic is trending in foods and supplements

If you’re wondering why supermarket freezer cases give over ever more space to sumptuous, indulgently flavored treats that also happen to be low in sugar and calories, high in protein and fiber, and scrupulously clean of label, blame Halo Top.

Halo Top, of course, is the sweet sensation that broke the frozen-dessert mold with its healthful bona fides, 2500% growth, and $342.2 million in 2016 sales-elevating it to 2017’s top-selling new food brand, according to IRI data.

And that explains why Max Maxwell, manager, market intelligence, Glanbia Nutritionals (Chicago, IL), insists that “Halo Top was the tipping point, is the tipping point, and continues to be the tipping point. The healthy frozen-dessert category is poised to grow much further than it already has, and it largely began with Halo Top.”

As far as Maxwell is concerned, the reasons are obvious. “Halo Top delivers the combination of attributes consumers have shown they want: better for you, indulgent, great tasting, convenient, and no guilt,” he says. “Think about it: One whole pint of Halo Top is just 280 calories, and a consumer could eat any portion, including that whole pint, without feeling bad about it-in fact, feeling quite good because they’re getting protein while they enjoy it. And that could very well be the definition of ‘healthy’ in terms of what drives consumers’ purchase decisions today: guilt-free indulgence with added nutrition.”

The brand’s success has inspired-or pressured-other brands to follow suit with formulation “upgrades” that involve added protein or “clean” sugar reduction, all of which leaves Thom King, president and CEO, Icon Foods (Portland, OR), with the impression that the “Halo effect” is “spreading like wildfire.”

“Every dairy processor that makes desserts has to be looking at this category,” he says. Speaking from his own experience, he says his company’s fielded more clean-label sugar-reduction projects from frozen-dessert customers than from any other category in 2018, “and we do not see that pace slowing down going into 2019.”

Even retailers have noticed Halo Top’s success, Maxwell adds, with several introducing similar products in their stores in a bid for some of the brand’s healthy margins. “And when retailers get into the game,” he notes, “you know there’s something good going on.”

Creamy, dreamy Halo Top is a far cry from the “healthy” frozen desserts of yore, which long ran to tired staples like ice milk and gummy-textured low-fat offerings. “The next wave after that was frozen fruit confections and frozen yogurt,” Maxwell recalls, “and none of these came close to the success of Halo Top. While some are still on the market and fill a consumer niche, the growth will likely be more in this indulgent, low-cal, high-protein space.”

Formulations are bridging the healthy-indulgent divide by introducing more of the positives consumers want-like protein-and eliminating or drastically trimming the negatives, like sugar and artificial anything.

“Currently, most brands are using dairy proteins, but that’s expanding into plant proteins,” Maxwell observes. “They’re taking out sugar, too, using alternatives like stevia or monk fruit, honey, and agave-type sweeteners as replacements. They’re also removing stabilizers, preservatives, artificial flavors, and colors and any ingredients that have more than a couple of syllables or sound like a chemical.”

As a sweetener supplier, Icon Foods’ radar is tuned to shifts away from nutritive sweeteners and chemically synthesized sugar substitutes to alternatives “that consumers can relate to,” King says. But they have to be functional in formulation, too-and many are. “Sweetener blends like stevia and erythritol as well as stevia and allulose lend freezing-point depression,” he says, which helps keep ice cream soft and scoopable, “and allulose really helps with overrun, making for a nice airy and fluffy ice cream.”

He’s also noticed a shift away from hydrocolloids like carrageenan to locust bean gum and natural hydrocolloid blends; indeed, he wagers that today’s hydrocolloids have advanced to the point that the mouthfeel, texture, and overrun of healthy frozen desserts “can be spot-on compared to traditional full-sugar versions,” he says.

Even ice cream inclusions are cleaning up their acts-thanks in part to companies like King’s. “The biggest gain for us is the development of our SweetBitz sugar-free inclusions for frozen desserts,” he notes. “We have sugar-free chocolate chips in 2-m and 4-m sizes. In Q2 of 2019, we’ll be adding inclusions such as sugar-free white chocolate chips, sugar-free butterscotch chips, sugar-free cookie bits, birthday-cake multicolored sprinkles, and more. Stay tuned!”

Having Their Ice Cream Cake and Eating It

It’s just another sign that no matter how high up the ranking “healthiness” rises, a frozen dessert is still a frozen dessert. So it had better 1) be fun, and 2) taste great.

Notes Terri Rexroat, vice president, team lead, Latin America, U.S. Dairy Export Counsel (USDEC; Arlington, VA), “Consumers are looking for healthier options in this category, but even with the demand for clean labels and convenience, taste is still king. Consumers won’t compromise flavor or texture, even for nutritional benefits. So the sweet spot for formulators is ‘healthy indulgence.’”

This even applies to the exalted Halo Top. “One of the factors that made Halo Top so successful was its healthier proposition,” Maxwell argues. “The brand calls out its high protein and low sugar on the label, which falls right in line with the macro consumer trends-it’s taking a traditionally indulgent product and makes it healthier. But what also makes it so successful is that it tastes good.”

Which is what this burgeoning category needs to keep growing. “If a healthier frozen dessert doesn’t taste good, it won’t be successful,” Maxwell concludes. “With so many brands competing for market share, consumers are in control of their choices and won’t tolerate poor-tasting frozen desserts.” Even if they have a halo on top.

We quizzed the experts on their top strategies for balancing wellness with “Wow!” in frozen desserts. Here are their tips.

In the past, enjoying a healthy frozen dessert meant “giving up something to gain the benefit,” Glanbia’s Maxwell says-“with that something usually being taste.” The current trend, by contrast, “is toward not having to make any sacrifices, and indeed, to receive nothing but benefits.”

That means cutting out no-nos like added sugars and artificial sweeteners while loading on the pluses like protein and fiber. And it means that formulations have to maintain the taste, flavor profile, and texture that consumers will accept as indulgent.

“We think ‘positives’ have the most long-lasting beneficial impact on a product,” Maxwell concludes. “There are still the ‘nos’ and the ‘lows’ that work-no sugar, low sugar, no artificial ingredients. But the positives have a more powerful appeal, particularly as consumers seek help in making better choices. The ‘nos’ get your brand in the game, but it’s the positives, like high protein or good source of protein, that have great appeal.”

King couldn’t agree more. “As I see it,” he says, “there are no negatives, only positives.”

Protein is clearly one of the plus-side ingredients that make category watchers bullish. And frozen dessert developers have their pick of proteins to formulate with.

“While milk and cream are typically used in ice cream and frozen desserts, additional fortification with dairy protein ingredients can boost nutrition to create consumer appeal,” says Rexroat. “Whey and whey protein ingredients have been used successfully in ice cream and other frozen dairy desserts for the past six decades. Sweet whey, whey protein concentrates at 24%-89% protein and whey protein isolates at 90% protein, are among the most commonly used whey products. Other whey ingredients, such as delactosed and demineralized whey, can also be used.”

To make protein-packed formulation even easier, King’s company launched its HiPro Ice Cream Dry Mix as “a plug-in solution to take the guesswork out of creating a superior product with fewer than 80 calories per serving,” he said.” A proprietary blend of milk protein concentrates, natural sweeteners, and natural gums and stabilizers, it produces a “home-style” ice cream with 5 g of protein and 8.3 g of carbs per serving.

The company even supplies a vegan version that King says is grabbing attention. And that makes sense to Maxwell, who notes that “what started with Halo Top in the frozen dairy space could well expand into plant-based frozen desserts. Imagine a pea protein- or bean protein-based dessert, maybe even with a probiotic. We’re just at the beginning of the growth and expansion of this category.”


	Yes, one of the key characteristics of a healthy frozen dessert is a sugar level that’s dwarfed by what you’d find in a less-virtuous counterpart. Consider that a half-cup serving of Halo Top’s vanilla bean ice cream has 6 g of sugar compared to the 20 g you’ll find in both HÃ¤agen-Dazs and Ben & Jerry’s vanilla varieties, or the 13 g in Dreyer’s Slow Churned vanilla bean.

But the trend in healthy frozen desserts isn’t just about keeping sweetener grams low; attitudes about sweetness perception are changing, too.

Says Maxwell, “It’s interesting what’s going on with sweetness levels in frozen desserts. A lot of people don’t want their treats to be overly sweet, and the range of alternative sweeteners makes it easier for brands to create products at sweetness levels that don’t overwhelm-and, again, give the impression to the consumer of a healthier product.”

He believes that as the crop of clean-label alternative sweeteners gains greater consumer acceptance, and as products ratchet down sugar levels of the past, “consumers’ openness to a range of sweetness levels will create opportunities for other brands to provide a range of flavors and sweetness levels.”

Good Things Come in Single-Serve Packages

Less sugar, more protein, and a “clean” deck of ingredients qualify a frozen dessert as healthy. But so, too, does a serving size that makes it easier for consumers to exercise restraint. After all, even too much Halo Top is…too much.

So one way that brands are helping consumers make healthier choices is by delivering frozen desserts in formats with an obvious endpoint. Maxwell notes that his team has worked with frozen-dessert customers in developing a range of different formats, “but primarily on the smaller pint sizes” that are just right for a single-serve treat.

And when asked what formats she thinks help consumers know when it’s time to stop, Nina Hughes Likins, global marketing director, Prinova (Carol Stream, IL), says, “All of them! Popsicles, ice cream bars, pushups, sandwiches, and single-serve products have all been innovations that resonate with consumers’ demand for a healthier version of frozen desserts and ice cream.” And one that lets you know that when you’re done, you’re done.

“Overall, the healthy frozen-dessert category continues to innovate to help consumers enjoy better-for-you indulgences that meet developing demand for global tastes,” Rexroat concludes.

To bring this notion to life in on-trend, on-the-go applications, USDEC, in partnership with the Midwest Dairy Foods Research Center at the University of Minnesota, developed a prototype for the 2018 Institute of Food Technologists Annual Meeting & Food Expo that blended nutritional benefits from domestic dairy with “the international flavor profiles consumers desire,” she said.

The concept: a lemon-ginger ice pop with whey protein (not pictured). “An adult spin on a classic kid treat,” as Rexroat describes it, the novelty packed 10 g of protein from U.S. whey protein isolate and fewer than 100 calories per pop. “It would make a great, portable option for healthy snacking between meals or post-workout,” Rexroat suggests.

We quizzed the experts on their top strategies for balancing wellness with “Wow!” in frozen desserts.

Frozen desserts get healthy

Tea, like coffee, straddles a variety of beverage categories that target particular consumer preferences, from the high-minded loose-leaf tea brewer, to the casual iced-tea drinker grabbing a bottle at the convenience store. Tea has something for everyone: it tastes good, it has functional aspects like energy, but it also has a healthy connotation.

So, while coffee is certainly experiencing a boom, particularly in the ready-to-drink (RTD) cold-brew space, tea, despite being considered a counterpart, does not necessarily compete with coffee, but instead exists in its own space. “Tea has become more the evolution from the carbonated soft drink, sparkling beverage platform, as opposed to coffee, which is more functional,” says Shannon Coco, strategic marketing manager, Taste, for ingredient and flavors supplier Kerry North America (Beloit, WI).

Renata Ibarra, senior RD&A director, Taste, for Kerry, agrees, saying, “Tea has a more healthy halo than coffee, so the consumer going after coffee would not necessarily go after tea. We think tea still has a lot of space [to grow] because [of the versatility], from the sweet teas to the unsweetened tea, combined with fruits or varieties like white, green, or black tea.”

With tea, the flavor possibilities are virtually endless, and the reasons for drinking tea are not limited to a particular function.

RTDs account for 46% of total tea volume, while tea bags account for 44%

. According to Nielsen, “liquid tea,” or RTDs, was the number-one product category in dollar growth change at the end of 2017, with a dollar percent increase of 18.9%.

 This was the second year in a row that RTDs took the number-one spot in dollar growth, Nielsen says. Considering the growth of the category, this creates a lot of opportunity for new and innovative flavor solutions as brands chase the ever-changing palates of consumers.

Among the biggest challenges currently in formulating beverages, including tea, is managing sugar content. A recent white paper

 by Kerry, which surveyed over 1,500 U.S. consumers, found that 46% of American consumers are trying to reduce their sugar consumption, 27% prefer products that are less sweet, and 50% seek out a specific type of sweetening agent in their products. That means a lot of creativity has to go into how a beverage, such as an RTD tea, is formulated in order to develop a low-calorie beverage that also hits all the right flavor and textural notes. This means combining sweeteners, using flavor maskers, or introducing other flavor profiles such as floral or fruit flavors.

For tea, this can mean any number of flavor combinations; it depends on the type of end-product that is being created and who it will be marketed toward. Some will want a tea that is sweet and fruity, while a consumer that is more of a purist will desire a more astringent and authentic tea flavor. Because of the level of customization that an RTD tea product requires, using tea extracts is advantageous.

“The way [extracts] are broken out is that we are able bring out the top notes, the middle notes, the different components of the flavor, based on the extract,” explains Philip Caputo, marketing and consumer insights manager for Virginia Dare (Brooklyn, NY). “We can change the levels of all these to get the taste that you want. You can actually change the taste of the tea while still using all the natural components. If you like the brighter notes, you can increase those, or you can add them back to a cold-brew tea to get rid of some of the off-notes that may happen from brewing.”

Synergy Flavors (Wauconda, IL), for example, has a portfolio of extracts and essences that can replicate the experience of drinking freshly brewed tea in an RTD format. “You put [the ingredient] and water into our propriety system, you draw off the aroma (which is the essence), and what comes out the bottom is the extract. Then you put them together,” explains Lindsey Oostema, business development, Synergy Flavors. In an RTD tea format, this creates that full experience of drinking tea by releasing the tea aroma, which will fortify the flavor of tea. Synergy also makes extracts and essences for other flavor profiles, so besides the tea flavors and essences, a hibiscus or lemongrass essence can be incorporated for a more nuanced and robust flavor. One must remember that much of the flavors we perceive comes from our sense of smell.

Part of the diversity of flavors comes from the diversity of the teas themselves. “Something we’ve been pushing is single-origin [flavors],” says Caputo, such as from Assam, Sri Lanka, teas from various regions. “That’s something customers have been frequently requesting, so that is often a selling point. We can make the tea extract just for the single origin and then flavor pairings; obviously florals, spices, that kind of thing. It really comes down to the type of tea. That’s the kind of flavor we will pair it with.”

One flavor profile that has continued to be popular in teas and RTD beverages in general has been tropical flavors, says Caputo. Tropical flavors provide the refreshment RTD tea consumers want, and it’s why citrus flavors continue to sell well and see continued innovation. “Trending and emerging citrus is definitely a platform we’re seeing a lot of traction in,” says Coco. “More exotic profiles that take a familiar citrus consumers love [and] bringing in that touch of exoticism-in particular, meyer lemon, yuzu, and calamansi lime are some things we’re seeing traction for in the market and continued interest around from consumers and customers.”

D. Bolton. “Tea Trends Flowing into 2018.” 

https://worldteanews.com/tea-industry-news-and-features/tea-trends-for-2018

Nielsen AOD, all outlets combined, 52 weeks ending November 25, 2017

Kerry Proprietary Consumer Research 2018. “Sensibly Sweet: Formulating for Clean Label Taste”

With tea, the flavor possibilities are virtually endless.

Tea’s limitless flavor possibilities cater to all reaches of the consumer market

's 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, we are recognizing individuals, groups, and companies whose initiatives today may help shape, for the better, the state of the dietary supplement and food and beverage industries for years to come.

First, there is CV Sciences, a company doing its best to establish a responsible presence in the midst of the mushrooming CBD market. As more CBD players, delivery forms, and product claims fly about the market-with little guidance, it seems-CV Sciences is staying grounded and, in a historical move, has become the first CBD nutraceutical firm to achieve a Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) self-determination for its proprietary, natural, CBD-rich hemp extract. This GRAS self-determination now sets the bar in the CBD market and an example for other CBD firms to follow, and there is no telling how this GRAS self-determination could pave tomorrow’s road to a better regulatory environment for CBD supplements and food.

Ardent Mills is another company laying a path forward for the markets it serves. Its new business unit, The Annex by Ardent Mills, is committed to increasing the supply of ancient and heirloom grains in North America through its grower relationships and taking an end-to-end look at the supply chain, helping formulators by providing innovative new grain formats and guidance. Altogether, the ability to source grains domestically and from more regions of North America will help companies as they face growing demand for these grains in healthy foods and beverages.

We are also recognizing two new initiatives, the Supplement Safety Compliance Initiative (SSCI) and the Global Retailer and Manufacturer Alliance (GRMA), for the work they are doing to, if all goes well, increase the level of industry self-regulation and quality control. While these initiatives are still in their infancy, their achievements so far in bringing together stakeholders throughout industries will help companies and retailers ensure that the quality standards and the benchmarking of those standards at the end of the day secure a safer, higher-quality product market for consumers.

And then there is Senator Orrin Hatch, whose support of dietary supplements has been the industry’s foundation-past, present, and future. The industry owes much of its existence today to Senator Hatch’s contributions. As Senator Hatch retires his congressional seat at the end of year, industry leaders remember his support and his friendship.

Ingredient Supplier: The Annex by Ardent Mills

Industry Leader: Supplement Safety Compliance Initiative

Industry Leader: Global Retailer and Manufacturer Alliance

In Nutritional Outlook's 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, we are recognizing individuals, groups, and companies whose initiatives today may help shape, for the better, the state of the dietary supplement and food and beverage industries for years to come.

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Award Winners

There are few figures more revered in the dietary supplement industry than Senator Orrin Grant Hatch, the Republican senator who has represented the state of Utah since 1977 and championed dietary supplements throughout his career, most notably with his most seminal contribution: the passage of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA). Introduced by Senator Hatch in 1993 and co-sponsored by Democratic Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa, DSHEA laid the foundation for what the dietary supplement industry has become today.

“The Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act was the watershed event that created the modern dietary supplement industry by finally creating a regulatory home that included, for the first time, a legal definition for this category of products within foods,” explains Frank Lampe, vice president, communications and industry relations, United Natural Products Alliance. “It established a regulatory structure and good manufacturing practices and also provided the U.S. Food and Drug Administration with abundant power to enforce the new law through a defined safety standard and authorities. The law explicitly allowed certain third-party literature to be provided in conjunction with a sale and for statements of nutritional support, or structure function claims. Additionally, the law also established the Office of Dietary Supplements at the National Institutes of Health, to foster independent scientific research about the benefits of supplements.”

DSHEA enabled the growth and prosperity of dietary supplements as an industry as well as a resource consumers rely on to live a healthy lifestyle. “Today, more than 170 million Americans take dietary supplements each year,” says Mike Greene, senior vice president, government relations, the Council for Responsible Nutrition. “The dietary supplement industry provides 750,000 good paying jobs in the United States, and with national sales just under $50 billion, the industry continues to thrive and grow.”

Providing some historical context, Daniel Fabricant, PhD, CEO and president of the Natural Products Association, explains that prior to DSHEA, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration treated dietary supplements as food additives, making ingredients subject to extensive toxicological testing despite most of the ingredients in question having precedent as a food. This was under a new FDA policy bolstered by the passage of the Nutrition Education Labeling Act in 1990, which considered any non-vitamin or mineral dietary supplements to be food additives, not food, as they had been regulated as since the passage of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act in 1938.

At the same time, there was a self-care movement in which more and more people were taking supplements. Senator Hatch was one of them. Beyond his responsibility to Utah, which has a high concentration of dietary supplement manufacturers, he cared about the products and the people taking them. “He took the products, believed in the products. It was the way he stayed healthy,” says Fabricant. “Senator Hatch was a boxer at a young age. He was athletic, very much interested in health.”

“He clearly understands how [supplements] support the wellbeing of millions of Americans and how important broad access to the products is for those consumers,” says Lampe. This, too, is one of DSHEA’s most important achievements, beyond helping manufacturers. “Its importance cannot possibly be overstated as it ensured that consumers had broad access to safe and reliable products” by enabling the industry to innovate responsibly, Lampe explains. “Instead of assuming all companies are making unsafe products, the law operates on the assumption that most products are safe, and the burden of proof is on the agency to prove otherwise.”

It’s also important to note, in these currently polarizing political times, that DSHEA was created under bipartisan leadership, showcasing the senator’s gift of reaching across the aisle.

DSHEA is far from the only contribution Senator Hatch has made to the industry. He has consistently demonstrated his commitment to defending the rights of both dietary supplement manufacturers and consumers. His commitment led to the achievement of other supplement-related policies, including the release of Good Manufacturing Practices for dietary supplements (cGMPs), serious adverse event reporting, and the Designer Anabolic Steroid Control Act (DASCA).

“Ten years after DSHEA became law, many in the industry were concerned that FDA was not implementing or enforcing the law,” explains Greene. “GMPs for dietary supplements had yet to be finalized or promulgated, and in the wake of FDA banning ephedra, there were growing concerns about the safety of dietary supplements. Senator Hatch called on FDA to release GMP [regulations], and passed legislation, supported by many stakeholders, including the industry, that would require serious adverse event reporting for dietary supplement (and non-prescription drug) manufacturers.”

Ironically, the adverse event reporting law saw some resistance from industry companies, says Fabricant. “There were a number of companies at that time in 2006 that thought it was a terrible idea, and a lot of those companies were in Utah,” he explains. “They thought this was going to be hung around their necks like an albatross, and that wasn’t the case at all.”

Once again, Senator Hatch brought people together to compromise. “Senator Hatch really worked with people on both sides of the aisle-people like Dick Durbin, who has been a critic of the industry, and Joe Biden, who at the time was a critic of the industry,” says Fabricant. “He brought them over to the table, brought the OTC folks to the table, and brought the dietary supplement industry people who were opposed, and got it done.”

As bad actors began selling falsely marketed dietary supplements spiked with anabolic steroids, Senator Hatch took additional action to protect consumers and the reputation of the dietary supplement industry by introducing the Designer Anabolic Steroid Control Act alongside Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. This legislation provided the Drug Enforcement Agency the authority to remove designer anabolic steroids from the market and stop them from being added to sports nutrition products.

A similar sentiment shared by many involved in the dietary supplement industry is that no one can replace a champion such as Senator Hatch. His support was singular. “It will be impossible to replace the experience, knowledge, and love that Senator Hatch has for the dietary supplement industry,” says Greene. “But we can continue to make new friends and build alliances.”

Indeed, there do remain friends to the industry within Congress, as is demonstrated by the nearly 50-member bipartisan Dietary Supplement Caucus. So, while no one can replace him, one can hope that there will be those who follow his example.

Myers S. “The Importance of DSHEA: Past, Present and Future.” 

www.naturalproductsinsider.com/regulatory/importance-dshea-past-present-and-future

As Senator Hatch retires his congressional seat this year, industry leaders reflect on how his support paved the road to today’s dietary supplement industry.

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Industry Leader: Senator Orrin Hatch

These days in the dietary supplement industry, no one, it seems, can get away from the topic of CBD. Hemp-derived cannabidiol (CBD) has taken the industry by storm, with more products and players popping up in the market every day and multitudes of questions raised at industry events: Is it legal? Are firms selling CBD taking a risk? And what about that Investigational New Drug (IND) application belonging to CBD drug firm GW Pharmaceuticals, which many cite as the primary reason FDA still says products containing CBD are not an authorized dietary supplement ingredient?

All are worthy questions, but one of the most salient questions is whether or not CBD is actually safe for human consumption. One hemp-derived-CBD company, CV Sciences (San Diego, CA), has taken a leadership role in demonstrating the safety of its ingredient and trying to chart a responsible path to market. In September, CV Sciences announced a monumental achievement: it now has a Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) self-determination for its proprietary hemp extract used to make the products in the company’s bestselling PlusCBD Oil Gold Formula consumer product line. This GRAS self-determination stems from a battery of toxicology studies commissioned by the company on its ingredient. These studies, conducted by scientific and regulatory consultant AIBMR Life Sciences (Seattle, WA), are said to be the first published toxicology studies since 1981

 on a hemp extract that contains naturally occurring CBD. CV Sciences’ ingredient is a hemp extract comprising a full spectrum of naturally occurring phytocannabinoids, including CBD, as well as fatty acids, terpenes, plant sterols, and vitamin E in all of its isomers. It is produced via supercritical CO

 extraction of the aerial parts of the hemp plant 

 and contains approximately 25% CBD overall.

At this point, it should be mentioned that in March of this year, leading hemp foods brand Manitoba Harvest announced an industry-first GRAS self-determination for the company’s hemp seeds, hemp oil, and hemp protein powder products for foods, with the company submitting its GRAS notification to FDA. There is a marked difference, however, between Manitoba Harvest’s products-seeds, oil, and protein powder-and what CV Sciences has obtained a GRAS determination for: a CBD-rich, full-spectrum hemp extract. In short, CV Sciences’ GRAS self-determination represents

 GRAS assessment of its kind to be performed on a hemp extract containing naturally occurring CBD. In fact, the toxicology studies done on CV Sciences’ Gold Formula CBD are “not only the first peer-reviewed toxicology work published on a hemp extract since 1981 but the first toxicology work published on a natural CBD-containing extract ever,” says Stuart Tomc, vice president of human nutrition for PlusCBD Oil.

John Endres, chief scientific officer for AIBMR Life Sciences, the company that placed, monitored, and published the OECD- (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) and FDA-compliant toxicology studies as well as the GRAS self-determination for CV Sciences, explains the five tests included in the toxicology study, which is now published in the

 These tests include: 1) an AMES bacterial reverse mutation test (testing for mutagenicity), 2) an 

 mammalian chromosomal aberration test (testing for clastogenicity, or chromosomal damage), 3) an 

 mouse micronucleus test (testing for genotoxicity), 4) a 14-day repeated-dose oral toxicity study in rats (a range-finding study to narrow the dosage range, with researchers testing extreme dosages of 1000, 2000, and 4000 mg/kg body weight per day), and finally, and most critically, 5) a pivotal 90-day repeated-dose oral toxicity study in rats. These are standard tests for determining the safety of consumption of a food ingredient, says Endres, who was the studies’ monitoring scientist.

CV Sciences’ hemp extract was determined to be non-mutagenic, non-clastogenic, and non-genotoxic. In the 90-day repeated-dose test, the researchers determined a No-Observed Adverse-Effect Level (NOAEL) to be 100 mg/kg body weight per day for male rats and 360 mg/kg body weight per day for female rats. Abiding by the more conservative of the two doses, the NOAEL coming out of these rat studies was therefore concluded as 100 mg/kg body weight per day. After dividing that number by a 100-fold uncertainty factor (to account for the differences between rats and humans), the NOAEL for 

 is 1 mg/kg body weight per day of the PlusCBD Oil Gold Formula. And when translating 

number to an Acceptable Daily Intake (ADI)-“the threshold above which safe use cannot be predicted based upon the current studies,” Endres explains-the ADI works out to 70 mg per day, based on the average 70-kg human. That 70 mg per day sets the ceiling specifically for PlusCBD Oil Gold Formula (the subject of the toxicological investigation) as to the uppermost intake level considered to be safe for humans at this time.

Tomc says CV Sciences wanted to have this GRAS self-determination in hand before the company launched its new hemp CBD gummy product this September, a product the company calls “the first hemp-derived CBD gummy in the natural products space.”

“We timed our gummy launch with the publication of our formal safety studies to give consumers even more confidence in our brand,” he says. With this successful GRAS self-determination now in hand, “Consumers can now feel confident that our proprietary hemp extract is presumably safe for its intended use,” he says. “Many companies have elected to watch from the sidelines and have been waiting to have a green light to participate in the hemp market.”

That market, the U.S. hemp CBD market, could be worth $646 million by 2022, according to recent predictions by 

The journal noted that U.S. CBD product sales have grown almost 440% since January 2014, with sales of $264 million in 2018 alone. As the CBD market becomes more sophisticated, and as more players enter the space, companies that demonstrate responsible practices are the companies that other parties (retailers, large corporations, etc.) will want to work with. CV Sciences has elevated its position. When asked why the company decided to pursue a GRAS assessment in the first place, Tomc answers: “We followed the directions set forth by FDA with regard to getting regulatory status as an ingredient to be added to foods and have introduced our proprietary hemp extract into the U.S. food supply via the existing regulatory framework.” Not only that, Tomc says, the GRAS self-determination “provides a regulatory exemption” in terms of FDA’s new dietary ingredient (NDI) requirements for dietary ingredients. He adds, “We are building a monumental safety dossier, including extensive after-market surveillance, to support our branded hemp extract.”

Whether or not CV Sciences’ GRAS determination opens other doors, regulatory and otherwise, remains to be seen. For now, Tomc claims, this designation at the least allows the company to bring other types of foods and beverages containing its hemp extract to market: “This gives us a tremendous amount of flexibility, as we are selling the only GRAS-self-determined hemp extract in the world. The opportunities are endless.”

It also strengthens the company’s standing in the hemp CBD food and beverage market-a market that’s only just begun. The promise is there. Tomc notes that while functional foods and beverages containing CBD are “just starting to hit the market, the market is maturing at a fast pace, and we expect a significant wave of hemp-based food and beverage products.”

CV Sciences deserves recognition for taking steps that no other CBD dietary supplement company has taken. As Tomc says, “Our historic GRAS work demonstrates the safety of our ingredient and represents incremental progress in the regulatory evolution of hemp in America.”

AIBMR’s Endres says, “We were really impressed by what they did because they were going out on a limb, for many reasons.” One of those reasons is that CV Sciences did not know for certain whether the study results would result in a NOAEL and thus a conclusion of general recognition of safety, yet the company invested significant resources to fund this study. “They 

 put their money where their mouths are,” Endres says. “CV Sciences is the only one that went out on a limb with money, investment, and time to properly establish safety and to obtain regulatory status, and as far as I know, they’re the only company in the United States that has proper GRAS regulatory status for their hemp oil extract containing CBD.” 

In a September CV Sciences press release announcing the company’s milestone GRAS achievement, the company stated: “CV Sciences is the only hemp CBD nutraceutical company to invest in the scientific evidence necessary to achieve this sought-after designation, recognizing an ingredient as presumably safe among experts under the conditions of its use.”

In that same press release, company CEO Joseph Dowling said, “This milestone significantly advances our leadership in this space and provides us with opportunities to broaden consumer access to our products, while removing any doubts [about] the safety and benefits of our products.” He called the GRAS self-affirmation “a milestone for CV Sciences as well as the entire hemp CBD industry.”

Michael McGuffin, president of the American Herbal Products Association (AHPA; Silver Spring, MD), says, “CV Sciences has made a significant investment to conduct a self-affirmed GRAS determination. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) sets stringent safety guidelines for the self-affirmed Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) status, and CV Sciences has reported that it has identified and provided the scientific evidence required to establish that this ingredient is presumed to be safe among experts when used as intended.”

McGuffin adds: “As an early member of AHPA’s Cannabis Committee, CV Sciences’ business practices and contributions to the industry demonstrate the company’s commitment to using scientific evidence to build consumer trust in the safety and quality of its CBD products. CV Sciences is also dedicated to providing complete traceability and transparency to ensure quality and safety, from seed to shelf. These practices have helped the company become one of the leaders in this emerging market.”

CV Sciences is leading by example, but it also hopes more CBD companies will step up to the plate and perform safety studies on their own unique ingredients. AIBMR’s Endres says more CBD companies are already “contacting [AIBMR Life Sciences] because they seem to want to follow suit.” He says, “I applaud that effort to try to do things the right way.” Also, unless a company can prove its ingredient is bioequivalent to CV Sciences’ PlusCBD Oil Gold Formula-“which would be difficult,” Endres says-companies can’t piggyback off of CV Sciences’ GRAS assessment; they would most likely need to conduct toxicology studies and a GRAS self-determination on their own article of commerce.

If more CBD firms can build hard scientific evidence demonstrating their CBD ingredients are safe, everyone benefits, Tomc says. More evidence and substantiation will grow CBD’s credibility among consumers, regulators, retailers-the public at large.

“Why don’t we all participate in demonstrating the safety of CBD, because the market demand will be greater than what any of us can meet alone,” Tomc says. “If everybody did this, that would be the way in which we could help secure the safety argument in the marketplace.”

“We would like to see other hemp companies make the investment in time and money to publish formal toxicology work,” he says. “Borrowed safety data will be of no help to other manufacturers. Everyone needs to roll up their sleeves and do the hard work.”

Rosenkrantz H et al. “Toxicity of short-term administration of cannabinoids to rhesus monkeys.” 

Marx TK et al. “An assessment of the genotoxicity and subchronic toxicity of a supercritical fluid extract of the aerial parts of hemp.” 

CV Sciences is leading the CBD industry with a monumental GRAS self-determination.

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Retail Brand/Product: CV Sciences

Ancient grains are a small percentage of the overall grains market, but there is no denying their growing popularity. “What’s old is new again” is the saying often used when discussing trending grains like quinoa, amaranth, millet, sorghum, teff, spelt, einkorn, and more. These specialty grains are increasingly favored by consumers who enjoy not only the eating experience but also the healthy halo often ascribed to ancient and heirloom grains.

The numbers reflect growing consumption. In January 2018, for instance, market researcher The NPD Group reported double-digit year-over-year growth in case shipments of ancient grains to U.S. foodservice outlets specifically.

 The company reported: “Case shipments of quinoa, which is the most widely used ancient grain, increased by 18.5% in the year ending October 2017 compared to the same period a year ago. Two ancient grains not as commonly known-spelt, a distinct type of whole-grain wheat, and farro, a whole grain similar to barley, quinoa, and wheat berries-also realized double-digit growth in case shipments. Shipments of amaranth, a staple food of the Aztecs and comparable to rice or maize, increased by 19.4% in the period.” In February 2018, market researcher Euromonitor named ancient grains one of the “8 Food Trends for 2018” alongside fermented foods and healthy fats.

Consumers can’t get enough of ancient grains these days-and, therefore, neither can food manufacturers, foodservice firms, and artisan bakers. But it may surprise some to learn that while commodity grains are grown aplenty in the United States, many of the 

 grains popular in the North American market are actually not grown in North America. Grains like quinoa, amaranth, and teff are, in large part, still imported. Quinoa, for example, is heavily sourced from South America. (Other ancient and heirloom grains, such as sorghum, millet, spelt, emmer, and White Sonora, are gaining popularity and are being grown on more farms in North America.)

One company is helping to grow the ancient grains supply in North America with an initiative started earlier this year. At the March 2018 Natural Products Expo West trade show, leading North American flour and grain innovator Ardent Mills (Denver, CO) launched a new business unit called The Annex by Ardent Mills (“The Annex”). The Annex’s sole purpose is to grow the company’s specialty business, which includes ancient and heirloom grains, organic grains, sprouted grains, pulses, and more. The Annex not only works closely with farmers and crop breeders to increase acreage of ancient grains in North America, it offers formulating and innovation services downstream to help manufacturers learn how to incorporate these grains in their finished products-truly providing support from the ground up.

“We look at grains in our portfolio and at how we can grow these grains in the U.S. We want to help the family farms we work with diversify and add these grains into their rotation,” says Shrene White, general manager of The Annex.

First, the company offers farmers the expertise of the public and private crop breeders it works with. Through its network, The Annex helps farmers who would like to diversify their crops by including more ancient grains and heirloom grains and pulses answer such questions as: “Is this a spring crop? Is this a winter crop? How does it fit into my rotation? Do I live in an area that is conducive to growing something like a quinoa or a teff? All of those things need to be taken into consideration when farmers are looking to add a grain like that into their rotation,” says White. “We can work with the farmers on planting the best varieties that will work best in climates that we have here across the United States.”

Diversifying their crop portfolio gives farmers added security as well as the chance to participate in new, emerging markets. “It allows the family farms we work with to participate in new, growing markets that they maybe wouldn’t have been able to participate in before,” White says.

It’s no wonder that farmers are interested in what The Annex offers. “We get calls weekly from these farmers who are looking to do something different, who are looking to diversify what they’re doing on the farm,” White says. Some farmers also see sustainability benefits, “where rotating with a sorghum or a quinoa will help save water, or rotating with some type of chickpea or a legume might be a nitrogen fixer for an organic farmer,” she explains.

Working with more farmers mitigates The Annex’s own risk, too. “It helps us diversify our growing regions so we’re not so dependent on one area,” White says. “If you get a hailstorm or you get rained on during harvest, you haven’t ruined your whole supply chain.”

The payoff is a consistent product supply. “We can offer our customers long-term contracts because we know that we’ve got farmers in all areas of the country that are growing grains for us,” White says. The Annex allows the company to be more nimble and proactive at meeting its customers’ needs by putting supply local and readily at hand. And it allows the company to engage in more markets. “Products and formats provided by The Annex are opening doors for Ardent Mills to participate in new areas within foodservice, the snack market, the pet food market, and the distilling market. It’s really opening up new channels for us that we just wouldn’t have been able to supply [to] had we just stayed with our core commodity flour business,” White says.

The Annex aims to keep increasing the number of farmers it works with. Through relationships built at Ardent Mills, the firm says it is contract growing with family farms in just about every state west of the Mississippi today.

White adds, “As we’ve gone out and talked more about The Annex and we’ve participated on different panels across the United States, we always seem to have farmers who make contact with us and want to come in and be part of the program. I think some of that is just knowing that we have a good reputation of supporting farmers.”

The Annex supports farmers by guaranteeing the company will buy the farmers’ crops at a set price and set quantity. “If we ask them to plant something, we’re going to stand behind it, and we’re going to buy that grain and find a way to use it,” White says. “Farmers know that if they’re growing something in our program, they’re going to get the support they need. They’re going to get paid for it, they’re going to be able to deliver the grain, and we’re going to find a home for it.”

That’s where The Annex shines: helping participants up and down the supply chain work with ancient and heirloom grains. The Annex offers the support of R&D and other staff to help end-product manufacturers find new and innovative ways of formulating with ancient grains and other specialty ingredients-for instance, “understanding the baking characteristics of a particular grain,” White says, or developing new ancient grain formats such as crisps, flakes, and individual quick frozen formats. Breeders can also help “to get traits into grains that are going to help our customers and the end consumer,” White adds.

White describes The Annex as a team of “15 really specialized people.” The team includes food/R&D scientists, sales and marketing specialists, regulatory/operations advisors, and even a culinary chef and a bakery. “These are people who can work with an R&D person, work with a marketing person, with the company, to really help develop a product from the ground up,” she says. “We’re not just going in and selling something; we want to be able to work with our customers all the way from innovation, R&D, to that final product. We can go from breeding, growing, innovation, supply chain, all the way to a finished flour or a loaf of bread.”

The Annex also has the full support of Ardent Mills behind it. “We fully understand that the core business is what’s allowing us to do all the cool, funky stuff we’re doing in The Annex,” White says. “That’s what keeps the lights on for us.”

By helping manufacturers create new ancient grain products consumers will love, and by reducing manufacturers’ concerns about stable supply-thereby making them less anxious about formulating with ancient grains-The Annex is helping make ancient and heirloom grains more accessible, which will only increase demand for ancient grains in the first place. “Making the right connections, both with the farmers and the customer, and understanding what is driving these trends is really helping us connect that whole supply chain,” says White.

It really comes full circle, White says. And it’s making a difference. “Take White Sonora as an example,” she says. “We started a few years ago with just a few acres of White Sonora, and we’ve been able to work with farmers up in the Pacific Northwest to expand acres and do seed grow-outs. This is allowing our customers to add White Sonora to their products and know they’re going to have a consistent supply.” She says, “I think North American quinoa is another really good example where we’re working all the way from breeding work with new varieties that are more adaptable to North America and helping farmers understand how to grow quinoa and get it adapted into their rotation.”

Can The Annex ultimately change the profile of the North American ancient grains landscape? White believes so. “I do,” she says. “I think we’ve already seen it starting to take place.”

She continues: “Do I ever think ancient grains are going to be as big as the commodity market? No. But I think we’re going to continue to find new ways to innovate and new, unique formats and ways to get these grains into the diet.”
	 

The NPD Group. “Everything Ancient Is New Again: Case Shipments of Ancient Grains to Foodservice Outlets Increased by Double-Digits.” January 3, 2018. Accessed November 8, 2018.

Euromonitor Passport. “8 Food Trends for 2018.” February 2018. Accessed November 8, 2018.

The Annex by Ardent Mills is helping to change the landscape of ancient grains in North America.

Nutritional Outlook Vol. 21 No. 10

How ketogenic is trending in foods and supplements

Frozen desserts get healthy

Tea’s limitless flavor possibilities cater to all reaches of the consumer market

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Award Winners

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Industry Leader: Senator Orrin Hatch

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Retail Brand/Product: CV Sciences

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Ingredient Supplier: The Annex by Ardent Mills

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Industry Leader: Supplement Safety Compliance Initiative

Nutritional Outlook’s 2018 Best of the Industry Awards, Industry Leader: Global Retailer and Manufacturer Alliance