Those unpronounceable, nonessential ingredients in packaged products and vitamins are often fillers, which are unnecessary and sometimes harmful for your health.
But artificial crap you're not injecting into your face? You're probably eating it.
As someone who created and manufactures a natural product, I can tell you firsthand how frustrating it is that the vast majority of dietary supplements contain artificial fillers, which are nonessential ingredients used to increase product weight and speed up manufacturing.
It’s not that there isn’t sufficient demand by consumers for natural products—there is. But making artificial products is cheaper, faster and easier. Translation? Higher profits and lower quality.
Manufacturing natural products, on the other hand, ain't cheap. These products are made with real food (grown from the earth, not a lab), so they are subject to changing weather patterns. This makes packaging natural products a long process. Cheap diet pills and synthetic vitamins? Manufacturers can churn those out in millions per hour.
Fillers in Manufacturing
I know and work with several contract manufacturers who formulate, blend, package and distribute a wide variety of products on behalf of multiple brands. Why do they use fillers? Simply put: It saves them money. Whether it’s a powder, pill, cream or liquid, manufacturers have to reach a minimum weight for the product. If the product weighs even one gram less than what’s stated on the packaging, it is out of federal compliance. You can be over the gram count, but not under. It's nearly impossible for every unit to have the exact weight and amount of each ingredient as labeled due to natural factors like evaporation, spillage and humidity. So manufacturers overcompensate by adding gram weight in the form of nasty fillers.
When I tell contract manufacturers that the formula for my meal replacement product has no fillers, they think I’m crazy. They all tell me that I’m “wasting” thousands of dollars “giving away” ingredients to consumers unnecessarily. I must be nuts to forge ahead filler-free.
But companies always have a choice: The choice of using extra amounts of their expensive ingredients (and giving the excess to the consumer for “free”), or using fillers to increase the weight should the final gram count come up short. It’s a lot easier to throw in some cheap polyethylene glycol than to repackage a product that’s out of compliance, but it’s also misleading and potentially harmful to consumers. Fillers also help enhance color (ooh pretty!), act as a flowing agent (to avoid machine jams) and make pills easier to swallow (bottoms up!). But they’re not good for you. Period.
How to Spot ‘Em
So how do you know if a company uses fillers? It’ll be on the ingredient list. Even natural and organic products can contain fillers, sometimes with ingredients that seem harmless, like calcium and talc. When it comes to labels, what you see is what you get. If you recognize and can pronounce every ingredient on the list and none of them are fillers, you’re good to go.
Common fillers are polyvinyl alcohol, talc, polyethylene glycol, calcium, magnesium sterate, titanium dioxide, odium benzoate, sodium molybdate, hydrogenated palm oil, calcium stearate, potassium chloride and calcium carbonate. Overexposure to these metals and minerals can suppress the immune system and pump toxins into your system. Ironically, you’re probably using these products to feel better, but you could be making yourself worse.
There’s a Better Way
You’re no dummy. You know that opting for the cheapest route isn’t always the smartest. I often get asked why my product is more expensive than other liquid meal replacements, and I always say it’s because it’s more expensive to make. If you can buy SlimFast for $1/can, here's the bottom line: SlimFast is likely manufacturing that drink for about 10 cents a pop. What the hell are you ingesting? Do you seriously want to drink something for breakfast that can be made and delivered to you for a dime? Even a damn banana costs more. The only way that pricing model is possible is for the manufacturers to use cheap, widely available artificial ingredients (including several fillers) so they can deliver you a full 10-ounce serving of crap and still make a profit.
As a consumer, you have the choice: Hold brands accountable for their ingredients and choose the healthier, not necessarily cheaper, option. It’s just that simple, sweetie.
Do you avoid products with fillers? Let us know in the comments section.
Lindsay Reinsmith, Contributing Writer
Lindsay is a writer, certified personal trainer and the founder and CEO of Kaeng Raeng, a vegan, gluten free meal replacement cleanse made in Palo Alto, CA. Originally a “meat and potatoes” gal from Texas, Lindsay now attributes her healthy lifestyle to ‘Skinny Bitch’ and trail running with her dog in the SF bay area. When she isn’t writing or helping others get healthy, you can find her volunteering for animal rescue, baking vegan cupcakes or cheering on the Stanford Cardinal football team.
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