The future of nutrition? Start-ups on alternative proteins, superfood beverages and on-the-go formats

19 Jul 2018 --- This year’s PepsiCo Nutrition Greenhouse program – an initiative designed to discover and nurture breakthrough brands in the European nutrition sector – has announced its top ten finalists. NutritionInsight speaks to four of these start-ups about their views on trends shaping the future of nutrition, such as insect proteins, energy-boosting superfoods and grab-and-go nutrition.

Ease and functionality are clear, resonating themes: consumers desire nutrition on-the-go, or at least in a convenient format. In this aspect, UK start-up Rokitpods particularly stood out with its repurposing of the popular Nespresso coffee machine for nutritional purposes: superfood nutritional beverages.

Rokitpods offers a range of nutritionally packed beverage capsules utilizing some key up and coming ingredients, such as organic Yerba Mate. The Rokitpods are also available in Organic Matcha and Organic Ulitmate (Coffee, Ginseng, Goji Berry, Maca). 

“Our concept is to give people a great and healthy alternative to coffee, using their existing machines. We have had consumers comment that ‘at last we have another use for our coffee machine’ as they have stopped drinking coffee for certain personal or health reasons,’” a Rokitpods spokesperson tells NutritionInsight.

“We decided to make it easier and cleaner for everyone to have a good healthy organic cuppa of something, like matcha green tea, using their existing coffee machines. Why should these machines just make coffee, when they can make it so simple for us to enjoy other super healthy organic drinks at the touch of button?”

On-the-go ease
Similarly tapping into the need for convenient nutrition is Revolicious: clean label, plant-based smoothie bowls with a packaging system optimized for grab-and-go use with a separate body and lid for toppings.

Revolicious founder, Jessica Barac, tells NuritionInsight that the increasingly busy lives of consumers has left them looking for healthy and convenient foods. “We have created the first product of its kind globally: Grab & go Smoothie Bowls with a 30-day shelf life. We noticed a real gap in the market for breakfast on the go that is nutritious and satiating.”

What goes into the product is also extremely important, Barac continues, as “seven out of ten people now read nutritional nutrition labels and want to recognize the ingredients that are going into the food they eat. The market is very discerning and looking for clean label, convenient, delicious and healthy snacks that give them sustained energy. We are also seeing a huge number of people identifying themselves as vegan, vegetarian and flexitarian – the market is responding with huge amounts of NPD to cater to these groups.”

Protein from different sources
Protein is a strong, on-going trend in nutrition, spanning from sports nutrition to the snacking space.

Gryo bars describe themselves as having “super alternative” proteins as the core of their DNA on the one side, and values in line with health, environment and ethics on the other. The company offers protein-packed nutrition bars that utilize innovative sources of protein, such as crickets.

“Our aim is really to give people a ‘friendly’ opportunity to discover super proteins that they don't know about, so the first criteria is this idea of novelty. Then we look closely into the benefits for health, environment and animal ethics,” Julia Berdugo, Founder, tells NutritionInsight.

“Insects, hemp and spirulina are really champions in these domains. They all boast a high and complete profile of proteins while being exceptionally environmentally friendly (insects consume very little resources, hemp uses little water and pesticides have a negative carbon impact).”

The importance of ingredient is key, Berdugo continues, and she knows this as a French national coming to the UK: “There are still big differences between markets in Europe. Whilst the tendency to be general and claim for healthy, green and delicious snacks is common to all Western countries, the criteria and knowledge behind it is very different. As a French actor who looked into the UK market, I can tell you the UK market is much more in advance and aware.”

The brand wants to offer a solution for consumers who are “checking ingredient lists, nutritional values and seeking for superfoods and alternatives.”

Lastly, nestled firmly in the high-protein snacking trend is Nibble, which also touts a low-sugar, long-shelf-life and low GI product profile.

“During the early part of our NPD, we spoke to dozens of manufacturers who all told us what we wanted to achieve was impossible. The lower sugar/shelf-life element was the hardest part to crack (since the sugar helps bind everything together and keeps the water activity down),” Erin Morony, Founder of Nibble, tells NutritionInsight.

Key trends driving the popularity of their protein bites, Erin explains, are low sugar and high protein. “Between sugar taxes and better awareness of the health benefits of eating less sugar, consumers are getting a lot savvier and eager to find lower sugar options.” Also, it can be a “struggle to find any protein snacks that aren’t packed with sugar.”

The Nibble bites are optimized to be eaten on the go and come in a range of flavors such as lemon, brownie and sour cherry.

By Laxmi Haigh