Why I recommend vitamins for my clients
As a nutritionist, probably 95% of my clients come to me seeking weight-loss advice. I have always recommended that everybody take a B-complex vitamin supplement, a multivitamin, and an Omega-3 fatty acid supplement. The B-vitamins are important for one of the most crucial physiological components of weight-loss: energy metabolism. The multivitamin is to ensure there are no deficiencies that could keep a client from optimum health and the Omega-3 supplement is primarily to combat artery-clogging fats (along with numerous other important benefits). I always said it didn't matter which brand you buy and my clients always asked me which brand I recommend. I didn't have a recommendation - I figured they were all the same.
At some point I realized that I had to undertake the research necessary to actually endorse a specific brand for my clients. They would have to be the best products available - that is my commitment for them and they deserve nothing less than the best. But wading through all the products in the vast vitamin marketplace is a massive task.
Criteria
Product Quality
There are quite a few companies that will take your formulation and make a product out of it for you. Nowadays anybody can design a vitamin formulation, pack it into a little pill, bottle them up, shrink wrap them, put them in a box and sell their own brand. This is why there are so many brands on the marketplace. However there is little or no regulation of these products. As you might imagine, there is a big difference in terms of quality of these products. Reputable companies conduct a third party test of the ingredients for each batch of product they ship. This ensures not only that the desired ingredients are in the product but that no poisonous contaminants (such as mercury, etc.) are in the product. Some ingredients - such as vitamin C or minerals like zinc - are largely identical regardless of source. Other ingredients such as omega-3 fats or herbs such as ginseng can vary depending on source of origin. Ginseng, an herbal root derivative, can be found in dozens of species. However the expense and potency of effect can range from very little to very high. Product quality is a widely varying and important factor in a vitamin and supplement choice.
Honesty in Advertising
In such an unregulated marketplace, there are quite a few supplement products that are making label claims that are a stretch of the truth. Enzyte (male enlargement; owner found guilty of fraud) and Airborne (cure for colds, class action lawsuit) are some of the more well-known examples. It was important to me to recommend products from a company that is committed to honesty in advertising. Vitamins and supplements are not miracle drugs. However they can be very potent and they can definitely help people optimize health or improve performance in the office or the gym.
Product Technology
We live in the age of technology and along with internet and electronics, vitamin supplements have seen their share of innovation. Most interesting is the development of "chaperone molecules" that are designed to prevent vitamins, minerals, amino acids, herbs, or probiotics from being destroyed during digestion prior to reaching the desired receptor in the body - thus eliminating its value. The number of companies with such capability is much smaller; numbering only a handful worldwide. However if you are going to spend the money and time to take supplements, you want to know you are not just swallowing candy, you are actually helping your body improve your health.
Nutraceutics, Inc.
I became aware of Nutraceutics through an article in Fortune magazine. I had heard of ProEndorphin around the LA celebrity circles as an amazing energy drink but the Fortune article conferred a much greater degree of credibility. Fortune rated ProEndorphin the best pre-workout energy drink available. I tried it and was extremely impressed (see my review). I ordered Nutraceutics' multivitamin (Vitrin), B-complex (ABC & Tea) and Omega-3 supplement (Marine Omega-3) and again I was very impressed. I contacted Jennifer Cherry, CEO in January 2007. Mrs. Cherry comes from 3 generations in the pharmaceutical development industry and - with her father Dr. James Jameson - are some of the country's leading nutraceutical innovators. Together they hold more than 100 US patents for nutraceutical and pharmaceutical products (Triaminic children's cough formula and the first oral form of acetaminophen - Tylenol - among his creations). I visited the company's labs in St Louis, Missouri and I realized how much different one vitamin product and one manufacturer can truly be from another.
Nutraceutics is not a huge company. Rather it is a family-owned business. They have avoided temptations such as misleading advertising or products with questionable safety records - thereby precluding the enormous growth of some of their competitors. However they have created a rock-solid, steadily growing business with a great deal of integrity which is much more important to me and my clients.
Originally only seeking products for my clients, I now felt that I wanted to endorse Nutraceutics. In June 2007, I made Nutraceutics products available through my website. As of yet I have had nothing but thoroughly satisfied customers.
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