Bright, Clean Orange for Beverages: Pure-S™
Consumers Want Natural Colours in Beverages
Over the past decade, naturalness has transitioned from a niche market to an up-and-comer to a mainstream expectation in the food and beverage industry. Today, natural ingredients permeate every aisle of the grocery store and every item on many menus. Over half of Italian and Spanish consumers buy products made with natural ingredients (Mintel 2024), and in the European market, natural claims in the non-alcoholic drink category are the most frequent on the labels, covering above 20% of the segment (Euromonitor, 2024).
50% of consumers actively seek out natural colours when shopping and dining.
Sensient Consumer Research 2023
Beverage developers seeking to add vibrant colour to increase consumer purchase intent and taste perception need a robust toolbox of solutions to create a rainbow of flavour.
While satisfying the demand for naturalness, product developers need to provide visually appealing products, as this is influencing purchase intent among consumers. Colours are key to appeal consumers: they attract consumers’ attention and raise flavour and taste expectation. Fortunately, the world of colouring foods and natural colours is bright and broad. New innovations joining the mix consistently, and product developers can create products with intense colour shades without compromising on natural claims.
Given the high-water content of beverages, it requires expertise to provide just the right solutions that show great stability. For yellow colours, Carthamus is the only suitable natural pigment that is naturally water soluble, and it gives a lemon-like colour shade. For warmer or darker shades of yellow, as well as for orange hues, Carotenoids like Beta-carotenes, or paprika are optimal sources. Yet these pigments are naturally oil soluble, thus need emulsion to be used in beverages applications. Sensient’s AET creates top-performing emulsions achieving bright looks and excellent emulsion stability in beverages.
A SELECTION OF SENSIENT’S KEY ENABLING SOLUTIONS FOR BEVERAGES
Click on each tile to dive into beverage colour solutions:
The Brightest, Cleanest Orange for Beverages: Pure-S™ Orange
From tropical citrus to sweet peach, to seasonal pumpkin, orange flavours make up the largest segment of the beverage category besides red (Mintel 2024). It is important for beverage developers to have a strong, stable go-to orange solution.
From the above-mentioned Carotenoids group, both Beta-carotenes and Carotenoids like Paprika are optimal orange options. Paprika in particular is an excellent natural bright orange solution, yet standard paprika carries a flavour that may impact the profile of the finished beverage, especially at high usage rates. Hence, to improve the sensory performance of the final application and remove off notes, Sensient offers the Pure-S™ natural colour line, designed with Advanced Sensory Performance technology, where colours undergo purification process to have the cleanest sensory profile.
Fortunately, Sensient’s R&D team developed a solution: Pure-S™ Orange.
The combination of two key Sensient technologies—Pure-S™ and AET™—creates a vibrant clear orange hue without flavour off-notes.
Pure-S™ is a gentle purification technology that mitigates flavour off-notes found in colour sources like paprika.
AET™ is Sensient’s Advanced Emulsion Technology™, enabling the use of oil-soluble colours in water-based systems by stabilizing the emulsions.
Developers may find other paprika-based emulsions on the market, but unlike Pure-S™ Orange these are likely to impart undesirable flavour off-notes in application, especially when used at high usage rates to achieve bold orange shades.
Pure-S™ Orange is also pH stable, so it will offer the same hue regardless of the acidity of the beverage system. It also has improved stability in the presence of Vitamin C (ascorbic acid), making it a great natural colour for juice-based beverages or any beverages or concentrates with high Vitamin C content.
The clean flavour profile and brilliant cloudless vibrant orange is unique to the Pure-S™ Orange solution.
The bold, clear orange hue from Pure-S™ Orange is perfect for beverage applications across the board, from ready-to-drink formulas to beverage concentrates and syrups. If you are looking for a bright highly stable orange for beverages, this is the solution for you!
