June 1, 2004

Are the Supplement Stores Turning into Junk-Food Stores?

A Globe review of 120 product tests by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency last year found that only 43 received a "satisfactory" rating. In other words, only 36 per cent of the drinks, bars and supplements tested by the CFIA actually contained what was on their labels, or met regulatory standards.
-- The Globe and Mail (May 15, 2004)

I have a friend who owns a supplement store, and I go to visit him every so often to see exactly what it is that people are buying today. It used to be pretty mundane, but in the last few years it has gone from mildly surprising to downright shocking.Today, the amount of questionable supplements that people are willing to consume and spend substantial amounts of money for in the hope that they might perform some sort of miracle on their bodies is cause for alarm. What’s more, it’s often done in the name of health and nutrition. But in my opinion, a lot of the products that I see these people using aren’t any better than what’s served in the fast-food stops, or sold on the candy rack in the corner store. It’s turning the supplement stores into junk-food stores.

"Supplements" used to be just that: supplemental products that could top up an already good eating program consisting of real food, to ensure that your body is getting the nutrients it needs. But many people today aren’t buying their supplements like that; for many people these supplements are forming the primary part of their diet – their main source of food.

Most obviously, there are the "meal replacement" products. First off, I don’t care what anybody says – nobody can call a product with a name like that a "supplement." It’s out to replace real food in one way or another. These meal replacements usually contain some form of whey protein, powdered carbohydrates, and sometimes but not always, vitamins and minerals. But there’s more, and it’s a little ugly. North American consumers have grown accustomed to a sugary-sweet taste with their foods – the junk-food world did it to us – so they naturally expect this miracle meal replacement to taste as good as a dessert. So, it’s also more than likely laced with chemicals and sweeteners to make sure that it tastes so good that you’ll want more than one – you’ll want to buy a whole box! But is that little foil package full of powdered chemicals really healthier than the fast-food stops just because there’s a picture of an athlete on the front? At least most of those fast-food places use real food.

Then there are the plain-old protein powders, which are among the most popular supplements for people who exercise, and for good reason: high-quality protein is essential for your body’s muscles and vital organs. Protein powders can be very good, but today, unfortunately, many of them are not.

The bulk of today’s protein supplements usually consist of some form of whey. Whey, in case you didn’t know, is a byproduct of cheese processing with a rather checkered history. Back in the ‘70s and ‘80s, whey proteins were considered low grade and no one with any money in their wallet would dare touch them. At that time milk and eggs were what was used for protein formulations. However, times have changed and the new supplement companies tell us that the biological value of today’s heavily processed whey is better than egg – a bold claim, because in the world of real food egg protein is the standard against which other proteins are judged, and milk comes next.

But let’s leave the milk-and-egg versus whey debate for another time. Let’s talk about whey, since that’s what most people find on the supplement stores’ shelves. I have nothing against it, and I think it might be fine, providing that’s what it is. My biggest question about today’s protein powders is this: Is there really all the whey in them that the manufacturers say? And who verifies it?

What I find quite alarming is the amount of studies that come out, similar to that done by The Globe, which have many companies fail on their label claims – outright fail. And we’re not talking about just a few. The Globe wrote that only 36% of the products tested met standards. Now, I don’t know how many of those were protein supplements – they tested a cross-section of products ranging from meal replacements to protein powder to bars to other stuff – but you can be sure that more than a few were protein powders. And of the 64% that failed, here’s my next question: What the heck is in there then? It’s supposed to be pure protein, and nothing else!

Here’s exactly why I find that even more alarming than most would: Today I see many people using whey proteins as their primary protein source, replacing real protein-based foods the way the meal replacements are replacing real meals. As a result, people are skimping out on real food that contains real protein that we know is of high quality and is actually there – like eggs, chicken, beef, fish, etc. – and putting powder and water in a shaker cup and chugging it down in 20 seconds, all the while believing the supplement companies’ advertisements about how these miracle chemicals are going to transform their bodies. I know more than one person for whom whey powder and water is breakfast. They had better hope that their product falls into that 35% to at least get some nutritional value from their drink. But whatever way you look at it, this is not a recipe for a good health and nutrition program.

Finally, there are those bars – yes, those bars, the well-known protein and energy bars that are even more popular among the eat-on-the-run crowd than protein powders and meal replacements. Do I really need to say more? Perhaps I should, because some people think that these are actually good for you, and many people rarely read the packaging to see all the chemicals many of these obscene little things contain. I regularly see people buying these bars by the box – and that box lasts them only two or three days! I’ll bet that for at least a few people out there, they’re breakfast, lunch, and supper. Thank goodness for all the flavors.

Besides the eating-on-the-run thing, one of the reasons I believe that many people think these bars are good for you is the modern-day craze that promotes eating as much protein and as few carbs as possible. Often, these protein bars advertise ingredient mixes that satisfy just that – no more thinking, just unwrap this tasty little bar from its foil, eat it, and presto, you’re on a diet. However, before you take the manufacturers’ claims at face value, let me tell you a little story about what some of the bar companies were doing just a few years ago – long before The Globe and Mail published its story about how many of these products don’t meet their label claims.

In order to cash in on the low-carb craze, some companies were trying to eliminate as many carbohydrates as they could from their bars. However, the chemical engineers, or whoever it is that formulates these things, could only get them so low – the nature of bars is that they are going to have some carbohydrates in them. It wasn’t low enough, though, to satisfy the low-carb crowd. So, someone had the brilliant idea to not list on the ingredient label all the carbohydrates that the bar contained. They arbitrarily decided that only certain carbs mattered – the so-called impact carbs. So suddenly many bars had astonishingly low amounts of carbs, and many people gobbled them up based on that.

However, people who bothered to read the bars’ labels closely realized that things weren’t right when they looked at the total grams in the bar and added up the categorized grams. Where was the other stuff? Conveniently left off, of course – even though it was all still there. Who was that good for? Not the consumer, of course. But it was good for the supplement companies who were doing it because they now had a more attractive product to sell. Luckily, the powers that be saw these labels too and clamped down on the industry, making the companies who had orchestrated their own set of rules to suit their products follow a real set of rules. So, today’s bars have carbohydrate counts that are much higher than those of a couple years ago – but the bars themselves haven’t really changed at all.

So does that mean that we should boycott the supplement industry in the hope that it closes down along with the stores? Of course not – we’d all lose. The supplement industry originally grew because there was a need for it – there is good reason to supplement your diet with some of the nutritious, healthy, and safe products that are available. There are supplements I certainly buy from companies that I trust (although The Globe’s article did dampen my enthusiasm a touch for how many I really do trust). And the companies that are producing good products are actually being harmed by the ones who aren’t, just as we are.

But still, we should never forget what these products are: supplements, and nothing more. Aside from all the exaggerated claims and the bold marketing promises, the one thing that works for our body is what everyone knows: food – real food. My thinking: We’d all be better off spending most of our time at the grocery store instead of the supplement store.

...Doug Schneider
das@seriousaboutfitness.com

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