Immunity, Energy, and Mood-Boosting Colors for the Beverage Category

Pandemic Heightens Consumer Desire for Functional Beverages
According to Mintel and the World Economic Forum, 53% of Brazilians stated that their health has worsened since the onset of COVID-19, and that feeling won’t easily be left behind. More consumers are turning to their food and beverage selections for support on their wellness journey, seeking out product offerings with added benefits and functionality. 34% of Brazilian consumers mention functional benefits as an important attribute in beverages (Mintel 2021). Energy seems to be the hot spot right now in sparkling seltzers.

Other “uplifting” type need states like immunity and mood-boosting are also ripe for post-pandemic innovation. Clean ingredient statements are essentially a must in the functional and wellness beverage category with color from botanical sources an obvious choice for brands innovating here.

Color Lifts Purchase Intent in RTD Beverages
As innately visual creatures, consumers gravitate towards colorful beverages because they equate color with taste. The brighter or bolder color instinctively conveys better and fresher taste.

On an increasingly crowded shelf in saturated categories like sparkling waters and hard seltzers, differentiation is critical.

Although most sparkling and flavored waters currently on the market (in countries where these are permitted and popular) are colorless (as required in Brazil), recent consumer research conducted by Sensient indicates that an optimized color matching the advertised flavor actually increases purchase intent, overall liking, and flavor perception. In a tangerine-flavored sparkling water example tested in the US in 2019, the use of a flavor-appropriate bright orange color increased purchase intent by +3.6%.

When Sensient tested a red sports drink compared to a flavor-elevating purple for an acai-blueberry option, purchase intent and flavor perception increased substantially, at +7.3% and +6.8% respectively. Purple connects with consumer expectations of “superfruits“, supporting both the flavor and the visual perception of imparted functionality.

Bringing Functional Beverages to Life: Uplifting Natural Hues
Bold and bright shades convey energy and mood-boosting qualities to consumers looking for uplifting products.

Red and Neon Pink:Thanks to vertical integration in our anthocyanin portfolio, we offer a wide range of cost-effective reds and pinks to help bring energetic concepts to life, which you can sample here. Our technical team can support formulation development to ensure natural colors work well in your specific process and application. We can create custom color formulations to perfectly match the flavor profile of the red you are looking to achieve. Sensient’s Color Experts can also leverage our advanced emulsion technology AET™ to create true FD&C Red #40 matches using clean-label natural colors.

Rising Orange: In 2021, Sensient selected Rising Orange as our Color of the Year. Brands can awaken the energy of consumers with joy, enthusiasm, and hope. Globally, consumers are proactively seeking ingredients like natural colors to help optimize their mood and body in order to heal, function, and thrive in uncertain times. Plant-based food colors with “health halos” like Pure-S™ Orange and Beta Carotenes are increasing in popularity as they bring to life specific moods in beverage categories. Sensient’s vertically-integrated cochineal portfolio also offers a cost-effective bright Rising Orange hue that is unique compared to the more common pinks and reds achieved using cochineal and carmine.

Yellow: For beverages using opaque packaging, turmeric offers a bright yellow boost. If light exposure is a factor for your project, my team can also achieve bright, vibrant yellow colors with additional color options, such as Beta Carotenes. Since carotenoids, like beta carotene, require emulsification  to perform optimally in high-water applications, Sensient’s Advanced Emulsion Technology (AET)™ enables developers to formulate confidently even with multiple emulsions (color, flavor, clouding agents, functional ingredients, etc.) in play.

Colors to Convey Immunity
31% of Brazilian consumers who have had any type of water consider it important that drinks have functional benefits such as strengthening the immune system (Mintel 2020).

Cloudy Rising Orange: In addition to its joyful, energy-boosting hue, Rising Orange is also associated with Vitamin C, fresh citrus fruits, and immunity-boosting benefits. Beverages like juice drinks, energy drinks, sports drinks, seltzers, kombuchas, and more can attract consumers and stand out on shelves with bright Rising Orange tones from orange carrot juice and other natural colors that bring to mind antioxidants and nutrients. The addition of a clouding agent (or the use of cloudy ingredients) suggests higher fruit or vegetable content as a premium feature.

We also have clean botanical extracts such as Hibiscus, Yerba Mate, and Ginger. We test the stability of color and functional extract combinations in-house to ensure they will perform as expected. Let us help your team accelerate new product development with immunity-boosting beverage systems!

Calming Hues to Promote Relaxation and Sleep
Since the onset of COVID-19 outbreak, 67% of Brazilians have given higher priority to their “mental wellbeing” (Mintel 2020).

Purples and Blues: Cool colors have long been associated with calming moods and nighttime themes, but these colors have historically been difficult to achieve in beverage systems. If you are able to formulate with a pH above 4.0, Sensient’s proprietary Natural Blue Vegetable Juice offers unique denim blue shades.  In lower pH systems, this vertically integrated natural blue remains stable and imparts cool purple hues. These options open the door to a wider range of soothing purples through blends with natural red solutions such as anthocyanins. The addition of a clouding agent to the color can expand the rainbow of possibilities even further to include calming lavender and other tranquil pastels.

Get Started with Natural Colors TODAY
Natural color is a great way to bring delicious and exciting flavors to life. If you’d like to sample a shade that brings a specific benefit or emotion to life, let us know in your sample request! Our technical team is always available to help you overcome any development challenges from stability to scale-up. We love to talk color!