Taste is a part of nutricosmetics brand identity and a gateway to a cornucopia of related products, and it is crucial when it comes to consumer acceptance. It doesn’t matter how healthy, innovative, convenient, or sustainable a supplement a product is; if it is not palatable, it won’t sell.
Market studies show that ingestible cosmetic ingredients like collagen, hyaluronic acids, ceramides, and MSM that taste good provide a competitive advantage for beauty brands. However, masking unpleasant ingestible cosmetics ingredients like collagen, hyaluronic acid, ceramides, and MSM is quite challenging. Masking them without using sugars and turning products into calories bombs – even more so.
Our secret relies on improving palatability in nutricosmetics, developing a revolutionary masking technology that has raised the bar on performance and acceptability. The solution for masking undesirable flavor notes in ingestible cosmetics systems relies on the right combination of different agents. Masking agents work differently depending on what they are hiding and the application. Masking tastes is nothing new, and the techniques used to do it can be traced back to ancient cultures. The most common one is sugar. It has been used to mask bitterness or sourness for centuries. Masking agents are often a blend of ingredients. Therefore, the way they work can only be explained by understanding some of the taste phenomena they may be involved in. Bitterness, vitamin and mineral flavor, or metallic flavor in a nutricosmetic product must be addressed with a masking technique that gives the end product an appealing taste.
The perceived flavor is a combination of aroma, taste, and mouthfeel. These are all delivered by oral and nasal cavities. Since many nutraceutical ingredients are perceived as bitter, this decreases their acceptability. And the simplest method to mask this bitterness and taste, in general, is to sweeten the product.
But what are the alternatives? Is there a healthier solution to it?
Liquid supplements are nutrition and wellness-related products and must approach taste with carefully selected ingredients suitable for the body and the mind. Nowadays, consumers are highly aware of the importance of a healthy diet. Therefore, they want to know these beauty ingestibles’ quality and nutritional value. That is why Tosla is using VELIOUS™ Masking Technology which improves the consumer’s experience without influencing a healthy diet.
To develop VELIOUS™ Masking Technology, our scientists first needed to understand the interactions in a nutricosmetics matrix and interactions in the mouth. From a perceptual point of view, taste-masking cosmeceuticals functions at two different levels: in-mouth (peripheral interactions) or at the brain level (central cognitive interactions). These two phenomena are the base for Velious’ taste-masking technique.
Sensory analysis, conducted by independent researchers, confirmed the superior palatability of the product using our VELIOUS™ Masking Technology over those without it. The study was conducted with four formulations containing high-concentrated collagen and MSM formulations. We used different masking technologies to mask ingestible cosmetic ingredients’ unpleasant taste. We used flavors, sweeteners, and sugar in different combinations with the first three formulations, while the fourth formulation was masked with VELIOUS™ Masking Technology. Most panelists chose the product with VELIOUS™ Masking Technology as more palatable in all pairwise comparisons with other products. The statistical significance of those results was confirmed using R‐index analysis. The panelists reported on better, fresher aroma, pleasant taste, and perfectly balanced, silky texture when asked about the product with VELIOUS™ Masking Technology.
Can VELIOUS™ Masking Technology deal with the new challenges in nutricosmetics?
As the beauty market is constantly developing and new active ingredients are presented, the challenge for Tosla technologists can seem intimidating. Fortunately, VELIOUS™ Masking Technology is evolving and improving, helping to prevent newly developed product disintegration, spoilage, or taste bitterness, imparting a beneficial beauty effect. VELIOUS™ masking technique can be adjustable and tackles most flavoring problems combined with a blend of different nutricosmetics issues.
Tosla leverages its knowledge in the nutricosmetics space and innovation related to collagen to create turnkey product solutions to help beauty and wellness brands capture the collagen beverage market, which is projected to grow at a CAGR of 9.8% and anticipated to reach $255.4 million by 2032.
Tosla is being built on the power of VELIOUS™ Masking Technology. VELIOUS™ is Tosla’s sweet spot and the key to a new delivery of unpleasant ingestible cosmetics ingredients. Formulations with pleasing taste and mouthfeel would always be preferred over a competitor’s product and translate into better acceptance and therapeutic value for the consumer, as well as revenue and repeat purchases for the beauty or wellness brand.
Tosla’s R&D team has been laser-focused on improving palatability in nutricosmetics, developing a masking technology that delivers palatable cosmeceutical products without compromising on a healthy diet.
