KIND ditches Fruit Bites line in a colorful statement against synthetic dyes

25 Sep 2019 --- US food company KIND healthy snacks is discontinuing its Fruit Bites line from retail just two years after the products were brought to market. The move is a bid to draw attention to the “unnecessary use” of synthetic dyes in a wide variety of foods consumed by children. The decision comes after KIND’s executives observed a preference among children to eat fruit snacks resembling candy gems versus the dried, whole fruit that the company uses in its products. The company has also unveiled a public installation it hopes to demonstrate the severity of synthetic dye consumption in the US.

The company aims to highlight the excess use of synthetic dyes in obvious culprits – like cereals and sugary beverages – but also “unexpected, seemingly-healthy” foods like fruit snacks, yogurt and applesauce. “Children are born with a clean slate. One that is shaped daily by the foods we routinely offer. We need to continue to educate our youth to put foods in their bodies that make them strong, energized and support long term health,” stresses Lara Field, a registered dietitian and founder of FEED Nutrition Consulting, in response to KIND’s initiative.

Despite pulling its Fruit Bites from retail shelves, KIND is continuing to offer the line's Strawberry Apple Cherry, Cherry Apple and Mango Pineapple Apple on its website.

“Synthetic dyes are controversial and add no nutritional value to children’s diets,” says Stephanie Csaszar, Health & Wellness expert at KIND. “Typically, vibrant colors positively correlate to a food’s nutrition and taste quality; however, synthetic dyes counteract this thinking. The food industry uses them to their advantage to enhance visual appeal, enticing children into eating them and parents into buying them.”

Synthetic food dye installation by KIND in Herald Square, NYC, US.The consumption of dyes increased more than five-fold since the 1950s, resulting in 43 percent of foods marketed to children now containing synthetic dyes, as highlighted in a report by the US Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). KIND is concerned that US kids are now accustomed to eating foods that are artificially colorful and less likely to try and enjoy foods that are naturally colored.

To demonstrate how widespread the issue is, KIND unveiled a public installation of test-tubes containing 2,000 gallons of synthetic dyes – the amount of dye American children roughly consume each day, according to research published in SAGE Journals. The installation, on display in Herald Square in New York City, US, uses the eight synthetic dyes currently approved by the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and highlights unexpected foods they can be found in – everything from microwave popcorn to pickles and fruit cups.

Beyond candies and sugary beverages, synthetic dyes are now also found in 95 percent of fruit snacks, 86 percent of frozen breakfasts, 57 percent of fruit/pudding cups, 39 percent of chips and crackers, among other categories.

“When we launched KIND Fruit Bites, we were unwavering in our decision to not use synthetic dyes in an effort to elevate the current fruit snacks category. Our unsettling discovery of the issue at hand compelled us to act and educate parents on the use of dyes in their kids’ foods so that they can make more informed eating decisions,” says Daniel Lubetzky, Founder and Executive Chairman of KIND.

Adding vibrant colors without the “nasties” is one of the biggest challenges that fruit and vegetable purees and concentrate can address, explains Johan Cerstiaens, Commercial Director, SVZ, in an exclusive interview with FoodIngredientsFirst. “In today’s social media-driven world, color is an excellent differentiator in many categories and SVZ’s range of 100 percent natural coloring foods can leverage nature’s gifts to provide the hues consumers seek. Beets, for example, can impart peppy red vibrancy, or purple can be obtained with purple carrots or elderberry,” he says. 

Natural botanicals have been pegged by industry as a clean label alternative to synthetic dyes, within this space, spirulina is currently seeing ample market share as the fastest growing botanical ingredient, largely due to its properties as a natural coloring agent and health benefits. The extract has proliferated across markets with 63 percent average annual growth (Global, CAGR 2014-2018).

By Benjamin Ferrer