Ramp up your antioxidants with…gum
We met Bonus Gum earlier (with their US election themed gum; a chance to poll, via chewing gum purchases, the electoral chances of Obama vs. McCain).
In their Monday edition of the Report on Business section of the Globe and Mail, the newspaper reported on the Canadian company’s efforts to try to introduce health benefits directly into chewing gum, a story that involved green tea (as you can see above) and a manufacturer in Denmark. In the article, company president Jay Klein described some of the challenge in introducing the new flavor, using chickens and eggs to make his point:
“As a startup with limited resources, it’s a chicken-and-egg scenario,” says Mr. Klein, president of Toronto-based Bonus Gum. “We have spent our time convincing retailers to give it a shot, but you still have to convince consumers, and move the gum off the shelves.”
Mr. Klein, who has a background in marketing and advertising, decided last year that he wanted to get in on a trend that has seen manufacturers imbue food and beverages with vitamins. He read a lot about the health benefits of antioxidants - molecules that slow the deterioration of cells in the human body and are believed to strengthen the immune system - and decided they would pair well with a stick of gum.
“Nobody has gotten into adding more nutritional value into gum,” Mr. Klein says.
After working with his Denmark-based manufacturer, Mr. Klein decided on two gum varieties: cranberry and green tea. Both products are considered excellent sources of antioxidants and, according to Mr. Klein, one piece of Bonus’s mint-flavoured green tea gum has the same health benefits as two mugs of green tea.