Dairy Alternatives:
Dairy-free, plant-based alternatives to dairy beverages are becoming more popular, while traditional dairy beverages are losing market share. Although dairy substitutes were first designed for vegans, the market has expanded to include flexitarians and omnivores concerned about their health, animal welfare, and climate change.
Almond milk now leads this market, although oat milk is rapidly gaining ground. The significant difficulties and possibilities are replicating the flavour and texture of dairy milk while also matching or exceeding its nutritional and dietary characteristics.
Other Non-dairy milk alternatives that are widely prevalent among vegans and lactose-intolerant people include
- Soy milk
- Hemp milk
- Oat milk
- Rice milk
- Cashew milk
- Macadamia milk
Low Sugar Drinks:
Another aspect of beverage formulation is the low quantity of sugar. Before implementing sugar-reduction measures, food makers should think about their eventual purpose. To begin, food businesses must determine whether their aim is sugar reduction or calorie reduction. If calorie reduction is the primary aim, food manufacturers can utilise stevia as their immediate sugar substitute, as well as sensory trickery and a natural low-calorie bulking agent like egg whites. If corporations are primarily concerned with sugar reduction, they should combine sweet bulking agents such as applesauce, low glucose syrups, or porous sugar with glucose syrups, spongy sugar, or stevia.
Sensory technology is another tool drink makers may employ to make their low-sugar beverages more enticing to customers. Reduced-sugar goods’ aromas may be analysed using electronic sensory (e-sensory) technology to see how firms emulate the taste of full-sugar products. The e-sensory technique creates a library of molecular scent profiles using gas chromatography. Companies may then compare the molecular fragrance profiles of their reduced sugar goods to those of their full-sugar equivalents to see what chemicals are required to replicate the odour of full-sugar products.
Hybrid Drink Varieties:
Companies that make beverages frequently create new goods by combining the finest attributes of other drinks and blurring the borders between product categories. Energy drinks, for example, increasingly include electrolytes to promote hydration, whereas sports drinks contain caffeine and other stimulants. Ocean Spray Wave demonstrates that sparkling waters may have caffeine from tea and taste from the ice. Coca-Cola with Coffee is one illustration of how sodas may mix with Coffee.
Functional And Herbal Drinks:
Clean labelling, pure ingredients, less sugar, fewer calories, and caffeine substitutes are all features of functional drinks. Products with these characteristics have been in great demand, and the epidemic has only increased people’s attention to wellness, immunity, and stress reduction. Superfoods, probiotics, prebiotics, antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, botanicals, adaptogens, and protein are among the constituents included in the next generation of functional beverages. Every beverage category is affected by this trend, especially tea and kombucha, energy and sports drinks, and bottled water.
Consumers are growing increasingly interested in functional beverages. Consumers seek strategies to maintain their bodies strong and healthy these days. There are available drink lines explicitly made for particular target markets. Energy and sports drinks are beverages consumed by persons who lead active lives and want to maintain their bodies as robust as possible. On the other hand, relaxation beverages would be a good choice from various functional drink kinds for persons with sleeplessness or other illnesses.
Consider your target audience before launching your own functional drinks company. Food Research Lab can assist you with your available beverage’s recipe development and manufacturing stages.
Food Research Lab has developed many unique functional drink formulations for clients from the UK, Canada, Australia, India and many more places where the beverage industry is very well expanding.
CBD Based Drinks:
Another rising trend is CBD induced food and drink products. Even though the FDA has not approved CBD in foods and drinks marketed in interstate commerce, some companies launch products. Through a subsidiary, Food Research Lab recently released a CBD product for a customer, a line of sparkling drinks including hemp-derived CBD and adaptogens.
Sustainable Beverage Packaging:
While the contents of a drink are frequently the driving force behind beverage trends, the package itself is becoming increasingly important. Beverage makers continue to be concerned about and challenged by single-use plastic packaging. By specified target years shortly, all major beverage firms have vowed to phase in bottles made from recyclable, compostable, and biodegradable materials. Furthermore, several beverage companies are switching a portion of their plastic packaging to 100 per cent PET, which has a more negligible carbon impact than virgin PET.
