Stevia-sweetened NutrientWaterX hits shelves
NutrientWater has released Australia’s first stevia-sweetened beverage, NutrientWaterX, in two flavours.
The beverage, available in ‘A-Game’ (strawberry guava) and ‘Refocus’ (Fuji-apple lime) flavours, contains 23 calories per bottle, compared to the 117 calories of original NutrientWater flavours, 200 for a similar amount of orange juice and around 250 for soft drink.
‘A-Game’ NutrientWater, a general health and wellbeing variety, will include a range of vitamins from A to E. ‘Refocus’, intended to improve brain function, includes Brahmi and Ginkgo biloba.
The beverages will combine the zero-calorie stevia sweetener with around 5g of fructose per bottle, compared to around 25g of fructose in original NutrientWater flavours.
“Stevia comes from a small shrub native to South America. It delivers natural, zero-calorie sweetness through an extract from the leaf, and is the key ingredient in our latest product, NutrientWaterX,” said Director of NutrientWater Luke Marget. “We found that stevia on its own doesn’t quite impart the flavour profile we wanted, so we’ve used mostly stevia, rounded off with five grams of fructose.”
NutrientWater, a Victorian company, released the first ‘enhanced water’ beverage in Australia four years ago, to fill the gap between water and sports beverage/soft drinks. The NutrientWater products use only natural flavours and colours.
Coca-Cola’s purchase of US company Glaceau VitaminWater brought the similarly-labelled product to Australia in 2008, however reviews of VitaminWater labelled it ‘sickly’ and ‘like artificial raspberry cordial’, and it was criticised for using sucrose and artificial colours.
Magret says that while NutrientWater’s marketing targets male and female customers 50-50, the new lower-calorie product is expected to be more popular with women.
The NutrientWaterX line has been included in the Woolworths product catalogue, and is now available throughout Australia.
