Today I send you the link to an article about the Health claims that are approved for a chewing gum by the European Union. The article mentions the mature Dutch market and says that functional claims are the way to keep a higher growth for the chewing gum compared to other confectionery products, but these functional chewing gums must keep a reasonable price.
It mentions the claims approved by EU, which include the use of ingredients such as carbamide, fluoride and xylitol.
Happy New Year 2013!!!
As some people has been asking me recently about the type of consultancy that I offer, I’d like today to post about this issue.
By clicking on the “Who?” tab you can see a bit of my CV and there I explain about the services I provide, which are both in the technical and in the marketing fields, always involving chewing gum.
I’ve been doing international seminars for many years and I enjoy a lot the training aspect of my job. I took my first steps in the chewing gum world and learnt initially from Douglas Fritz. Doug is still a key reference in the chewing gum world and I want to express my appreciation and admiration from here. He also invited me to participate in his book “Formulation and Production of Chewing and Bubble Gum”, Kennedy’s Publications Ltd, London , UK.
I also participated a lot in the exciting area of New Product Development, working in many research centers and together with R&D Departments of important companies worldwide I participated in the creation of some of the chewing gums that are today in the market. I have experience both in formulation/ingredients and also from the process/machinery point of view.
Finally, as I was for 8 years working in Sales, taking care of the commercial activity in 35 different countries around the world, I can look at the chewing gum world from the Marketing and Sales point of view. I like studying the trends of the market and keeping contact with all the players of the industry (ingredient suppliers, machinery suppliers, chewing gum manufacturers,…).
You can contact me in my e-mail: joanmestres@hotmail.com and I’ll be glad to answer your requests. Of course, if you want to send me information to be posted in this blog, I’d very much appreciate it as well!
I will be attending next ISM and ProSweets (Cologne, Germany 27th – 31th January) so I hope to see you there as well.
A “deviation” form the issue of biodegradable chewing gum is the controversy about taxes applied to the product.
Some politicians claim that, as one can find chewing gum stuck everywhere on the streets, and this cost money to remove, then a tax should be imposed on the sale of gum. The money collected from this tax will be “supposedly” used to clean the streets. The issue was on the news some time ago in relation to Ireland and Wales. Now, two more news appeared recently with the same discussion, this time related to Mexico and Northern Ireland (see links from Confectionerynews.com below). As many of you may already know, Singapore is the only country where chewing gum is officially banned, except for those with health claims, which can be sold in pharmacies.
Wrigley is the strongest fighter against those policies and supports educational programs instead of taxes (which reach 50% on top of the retail price in case of Mexico!).
So I guess until nobody finds a successful biodegradable chewing gum (or should I say simply “degradable chewing gum”?), we will find these type of discussions here and there.
http://mobile.confectionerynews.com/Regulation-Safety/Chewing-gum-tax-proposed-in-Mexico
http://mobile.confectionerynews.com/Regulation-Safety/Chewing-gum-tax-calls-in-Northern-Ireland
There are not many news about ingredients for gum base. Basically because, as you know, this field of research is quite restricted and companies keep their own developments for themselves. However, yesterday, confectionerynews.com informed about a new resin from Wacker (Germany) which claims to improve many properties of the gum base. The name of this ingredient is “Capiva” and according to the article it reduces the processing time, improves the flavour release, increases the shelf life, reduces the stickiness and increases the elasticity.
I am happy that some of the research on gum base production is openly communicated and published. Usually, the general public can follow the developments on this field only by the patents that are being filed now and then, so this is like fresh air sneaking through. I hope it is not the last time and that the community can read more of these type of news.
Here is the link to the article:
© 2012 – William Reed Business Media SAS – All Rights Reserved
Wrigley files a patent of fibre-containing chewing gum
I read in confectionerynews.com (see link attached) about this new patent that Wrigley has filed, claiming improved texture, flavour release and healthiness.
During next weeks I will be giving presentations about Chewing gum technology in two well-recognized organizations.
The first will be ZDS, in Solingen/Germany, on 29th October. They have a four-week long Sugar Confectionery Course dealing with all what is around technologies in this field (candy, jelly, marshmallow, coating, …) and I will be glad to discuss for eight hours with the participants about different aspects of chewing gum. Participants come from all around the world. You can find out more in http://www.zds-solingen.de
The second one will be in Leatherhead, United Kingdom, on 8th November. Here there is also a Sugar Confectionery Course and I will take care of the chewing gum presentation. The web is http://www.leatherheadfood.com
I have been lecturing in both places for more than 10 years and I must say that it is one of the most enjoyable moments of the year for me. I always find interesting to exchange ideas and experiences with other people
For those of you that are interested on knowing more and more about technological aspects around chewing gum, I can reccommend the book “Formulation and Production of Chewing and Bubble Gum”, by Douglas Fritz. You can find it in different internet stores ( http://www.woodheadpublishing.com/en/book.aspx?bookID=1965 or http://www.amazon.com/Formulation-production-chewing-bubble-gum/dp/0955808529 and others). In this book you will find the top relevant issues that interest you.
The giant Kraft has a post in its website asking for inputs that will help them develop a biodegradable gum base. Those inputs can be “novel and inventive ingredients, processing methods and technology solutions”
You can read more on:
http://www.kfcollaborationkitchen.com/EN/What/Pages/NeedInformation.aspx?bid=E50EFBE8-E5E4-4044-9C79-4ECA806A84E6
It has been many years that the main players in the chewing gum field are researching in this direction, with many filed patents but limited results in the market. As the issue become hotter and hotter, maybe we can really see something relevant in the market soon….
Kraft (via RSSL center in UK) is looking for novel food approval for a new gum base recently developed. This gum base seems to contain a polymer currently used in cosmetic (oral care) products. You can read the article here:
What surprises me is that the article mentions that the expected time for degradation is going to be “equivalent to other synthetic polymer gum bases”.
We’ll wait for more news on this and see if finally we get a real breakthrough in the market.
According to Nielsen, the sales of chewing gum from 2001 until Nov 2010 were 813 Million US$ in Italy, the number one country in Europe in terms of value. Number two, very close is Germany with 804 M US$, then France and at more distance Spain and UK with vlaues almost half of those for the leaders.
Instead, if we see the figures for candy, the number one in volume by far is Germany with 333 Million kilos of candy consumed. Far from that is second place for UK with 172 M kg, France 109 M kg and then Holland, Italy and Spain. The consumption of candy per capita is lead by Germany, UK, The Netherlands, Denmark and Ireland, with more than 3kg per person and year. Portugal and Greece show the lowest figures with less than 1 kg per person and year.
Chewing Gum Consultant 