Detoxing is all the rage. We are told that eating and living the right way can cure all manner of ills from headaches to tiredness to blocked-up noses. In the UK, celebrities such as Carol Vorderman have written books on detoxing, giving it more popular appeal. So what is detoxing, and what can food manufacturers do to cash in? Hugh Westbrook investigates.
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Detoxing is literally removing the toxins from your system. It builds on ancient traditions such as Ayurveda, which believes that a cleansing diet can cure many problems. Toxins come into the bloodstream from manufactured food and 21st-century stresses. Removing them should therefore lead to a new you. A full detox revolves around eating many natural foods, often raw, and making fundamental lifestyle changes. There are also supplements to take, but food products are now beginning to take the place of some of the capsules. A full detox can be quite a scary experience, as those undergoing them can often feel considerably worse before feeling better.
It can be quite difficult to understand what detox means. UK-based Go-Go Fruit Baskets sells a ‘detox’ fruit basket. Since fruit is by its very nature detoxifying, just-food.com asked the company why it was using the name. A spokesman explained that it had more citrus in it than some of the other baskets, and they had designed it after an employee read Carol Vorderman’s book.
Manufactured foods defeat the object
Those heavily involved in detox are pleased to see it garnering headlines, though do not believe that manufactured products are the way to go. Shazzie, who runs the Detox Your World website promotes a wide variety of raw foods and supplements on her site, such as natural dietary sulphur MSM or Nori, which is made from seaweed.
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By GlobalDataShazzie told just-food.com that bringing detoxing into popular consciousness “might be watered down information but it’s on the right track. If somebody has a burger one day and replaces that with a smoothie the next day, you’re taking in less toxins so that is starting detoxing.
“People should start with organic, change their breakfast and have juice or fruit, then change lunch to include salad. We need to give steps for people to do; one change can make a massive difference.”
There are problems with the classic detox. One is that preparing the food can take a long time, and anybody who has attempted to wash a juicer with any regularity will understand. The other is that the diet can be boring, and in many cases revolves around obscure ingredients. So the challenge for mainstream manufacturers is clear – make detox products easier and nicer.
Detox drinks leading the charge
Drinks are currently the classic way to go. Thorncroft Cordials sells a highly successful detox cordial, based on dandelion and burdock. London-based Innocent Drinks sells a detox smoothie made of lemon, ginger and honey.
Innocent’s Head of Products Lucy Ede told just-food.com that the detox smoothie had to be consumed as part of a detoxing lifestyle. “Consumer demand showed that there was a call for a detox smoothie – we already had a lot, such as blackberry and blueberry, we never chose to badge them as detox.
“We thought about all the ingredients which would have inherent natural detoxing properties and tried to use ingredients which we weren’t currently using. It had to taste and look different.
“We went through all of the ingredients which we felt had natural detoxing benefits. The simplest in terms of detoxing is cleansing, so lemon is fantastic, while ginger helps digestion and stimulates it, while honey is in there to balance the flavour. We ended up with something really cleansing and full of vitamin C.”
Detox not for emergencies
Ede said that some people regard detoxing as something to do after weeks of over-indulgence, while others are more “hard-core” and live on vegetable juice. She said that more educated consumers realise the truth lies somewhere in the middle and make non-dramatic lifestyle changes. “We don’t advocate a bad lifestyle and then say drink smoothies three days a year.”
She also said taste is important, adding: “The drinks taste really nice and they’re seen as a little treat, so not like spinach juice or wheatgrass,” which are other traditional detoxing ingredients.
The company is, however, planning to cash in on a time of the year when people are looking for healthy options after over-indulging, and will launch a new product on 1 January to cash in on the post-Christmas market. The beetroot-based smoothie will be a little stronger than the current product.
Toxin awareness growing in the US
The market in America is somewhat different to the UK as detoxing has been part of consciousness for longer. It has therefore grown steadily, rather than suddenly booming.
Daily Detox, owned by MD Labs, has been in the American market for around 20 years. The company sells two different detox formulae in tea or capsule format.
Vice president Jay Yager told just-food.com that the formulations had been taken from ancient Chinese herbal remedies that allowed the body to clean itself.
“People have been concerned about build-up of toxins,” he said. “Meanwhile, people are becoming more aware of toxins in daily life.”
Similarly to British companies, Yager knows that drinking a detox tea cannot simply make somebody feel better – it has to be part of a lifestyle choice.
He added that it was important that the company had two lines. “Lots of tea companies will have one detox tea. We have multiple lines because the body gets used to one formulation, so we have the two to allow people to alternate.”
Weight loss allied to detox
The company is expecting its next big growth area to be weight loss products, and is combining its teas with some of its fibre products in weight loss packs. “There is lots of growth expected there,” Jager commented.
It is also trying to penetrate the day salon and spa market as it has become “very big with the middle classes”, selling its products into cafés for consumers to drink on the spot as part of their salon experience.
Detox those teeth!
But food manufacturers need to beware. They no longer have total use over the term detox. Macleans has recently launched a Detox toothpaste into the UK market. Quite clearly this cannot be flushing toxins out of the system. So why has the term been used?
The company told just-food.com: “It is an interesting and modern way to describe the feeling of purity and freshness this product delivers to a ‘morning mouth’. We researched this with consumers and they understood the link we were making between removing bacteria from the mouth and detox/purification.”
The company argues that removing bacteria from the mouth is similar to detox process. “The product is different from many everyday toothpastes because of its anti-bacterial properties. This said, there are some other toothpastes with anti-bacterial properties on the market that could offer similar benefits to Detox”
So is Macleans taking on the food market? Apparently not. The company said: “It is definitely not designed to compete with or be an alternative to any dietary programmes designed to ‘detoxify’ the body. It is entirely aimed at offering people an effective way to improve their oral hygiene.”
It is clear that the term detox lends itself to many interpretations. The challenge for food manufacturers is to establish clearly in consumers’ minds what it means and then produce simple-to-use products which taste pleasant if they want to have a piece of the market.
