Industry Trend: Functional Beverage

Industry Trend: Functional Beverage

This trend of functional beverages is carving out its own niche in the drink market. Those who are involved in this revolution are PepsiCo Inc., Fuze, Ocean Spray, Red Bull, Nestle and General Mills Inc. Besides these big names, other smaller start-up companies have started to join the movement towards functional beverages as well. Rob Paul, Ph.D., ABCN and Jim von der Heydt started the product, Nawgen, and it has begun to take off in the functional beverage marketplace. 

What It Is: A functional beverage can be defined as a non-alcoholic drink that includes non-traditional ingredients in its make up. This can include herbs, vitamins, minerals, amino acids or raw fruit and vegetable ingredients. These drinks are meant to provide health benefits that go beyond daily nutrition. There are a variety of drinks that stem from this functional beverage market including sports and performance drinks, energy drinks, enhanced fruit drinks, soy beverages and enhanced water.

Who Might be Interested: These drinks target a variety of consumers depending on which segment of the functional beverage market you pursue. Energy drinks such as Red Bull might interest business people who need an extra kick of caffeine while Vitamin Water might target athletes or health conscious people. I think there is a functional drink for everyone no matter what their interest.

Just the Facts:

* Some of the trends in functional beverages are in hydration, energy and rejuvenation, health and wellness, alertness and relaxation, and weight management.

* Some common functional drinks are Gatorade, Red Bull, Vitamin Water and Enviga.

* Nawgen improves attention and causes better organization through EEG theta activity, EEG alpha activity and EEG coherence.

* 5 Key Ingredients in Nawgen

Cognizin^® citicoline

                        - Supports phospholipid building blocks of brain cells (structure)

                        - Cholinergic precurser (for memory)

A-GPC

                        - Cholinergic precurser (for memory)

Lycopene

                        - Anti-inflammatory (occurs when brain is damaged)

Vitamin E (Natural)

                        - Antioxidant (consequence of metabolism)

Caffeine (Natural)

-       Adenosine agonist (stimulant and neuroprotection)

Availability: Most of these beverages are available to purchase online but some of the more commercialized drinks can also be found in grocery stores and pharmacies.