FDA not thrilled with surge in caffeinated foods
By Brady Dennis, Washington Post
Who needs coffee for breakfast when you can pour Wired Wyatt’s caffeinated maple syrup over your Wired Waffles? Remember Cracker Jack? This year saw the advent of Cracker Jack’d Power Bites, with as much caffeine per serving as a cup of coffee.
Americans, it turns out, are willing to gobble up caffeine in all kinds of foods — from potato chips to sunflower seeds to beef jerky. Not to mention gummy bears and marshmallows. Energy-boosting foods racked up more than $1.6 billion in domestic retail sales last year, up nearly 50 percent from five years ago, according to the market research firm Euromonitor International.
The trend, experts say, reflects a rush by food manufacturers to cater to consumers’ increasingly frenetic lives — and to cash in on the popularity and profitability of high-caffeine energy drinks.
“This is something that’s going to continue to grow,” said Roger Sullivan, founder of Wired Waffles, based in Marysville, Wash. He says his product is popular with endurance runners, long-haul truck drivers and sleep-deprived college students. “It’s definitely a market where I think a lot of large companies are figuring out how to jump in.”
But the growing interest of big food companies might mean the party is over, at least for now.
The Food and Drug Administration threw a wet blanket on the caffeine-laced food craze recently when it asked foodmakers to take a timeout. Concerned about the potential health effects on children, as well as Americans’ cumulative caffeine intake, officials said they want to investigate whether new rules are needed to govern caffeine in foods.
“It’s a trend that raises real concerns,” Michael Taylor, the FDA’s top food safety official, said in an interview. “We’re not here to say that these products are inherently unsafe. We’re trying to understand, what are the right questions to be asking? … We have to figure out, what are the right ways to approach this?”
The agency, which has watched the proliferation of caffeinated foods with increasing alarm, took action after Wrigley launched a caffeinated gum, Alert Energy, in late April with full-page newspaper ads, a promotion at 7-Eleven stores and a NASCAR car plastered with the gum’s logo. Each stick contains the caffeine of half a cup of coffee.
“When you start putting [caffeine] in these different products and forms, do we really understand the effects?” Taylor said, describing the concerns he and others shared with Wrigley executives who met with FDA officials shortly after the rollout of Alert Energy gum. “Isn’t it time to pause and exercise some restraint?”
The company, which declined an interview request, quickly pulled its new gum from the market. While noting that it had put the caffeine content on the label and marketed Alert Energy only to people over 25, Wrigley said in a statement that it was halting production “out of respect for the FDA” while the agency developed “a new regulatory framework” for caffeinated food and drinks.
Taylor said FDA officials have long been aware of smaller manufacturers making niche caffeinated food. He said the agency became concerned when food giants such as PepsiCo — which owns Frito-Lay, the maker of Cracker Jack’d — and other companies began dipping their toes into the caffeinated food market.
Is caffeine a controlled substance now? Why is this any of the government’s business?
They really do think we are too stupid to make our own decisions, don’t they? Might as well just put us all in camps for our own protection. Sheesh!
I am sure the issue is as simple as you portrayed it and your subtle reference to nazis is not hyperbolic.
No need to be concerned about caffeinated food products marketed to children. They are all ready loopy from soda, an extra dose of caffeinated chips followed by some caffeinated gum is actually good for their cardiovascular system.
Let’s allow anything to be directly marketed to kids, because corporations are always trustworthy. We need watermelon flavored caffeinated cigarettes in the mouths of every 4th grader.
Wow, talk about hyperbolic… sheesh
I’ve got a vested interest in caffeine, so I think the free market should decide and the govt should leave alone this Pandora’s box of regulatory framework some are proposing. Think about it:
Are they going to card you at Starbucks?
Will they require warnings and caffeine levels on everything that caffeine is in, from teas to chocolate?
The real, underlying problem is that common sense ‘ain’t too common no mo’ and people don’t responsibility for their own actions (let alone those of their children) so the govt is compelled to step in and ‘protect its citizenry’ from itself.
I mean, who really doesn’t know that MODERATION IS KEY??? And “too much of anything can be a bad thing.”
This loss of ‘personal responsibility’ in individuals is leading to a loss in personal liberties for all of society.
Well said, Ryan Payne.
I am dearly devoted to my daily coffee.
Yup, I like both the flavor of a good strong cup of coffee, and the slight kick of caffeine. I freely admit that if I don’t get coffee I get a headache that lasts about a day. But I will never resort to waffles or potato chips as a substitute for coffee.
After decades of the news of studies that coffee is bad, it will kill you, to ultimately, the latest opinion that in moderation it won’t hurt you, and it does have some desired attributes like alertness,and an enhanced affect of some pain medicines. I thought we were done with it and was glad for that.
But caffeine in potato chips and waffles? I expect this is a fad driven thing and that as soon as it no longer looks cool to go around chugging ever bigger energy drinks etc it will die its own death like the hula hoop.
We are a fad driven society, and it should be left to run its course. By the time the laws get made, and all the studies done, the fad will have moved on to other equally dumb things. The government should stay out of it.
The reality of course is, our government is for sale. If the food giants want regulations gone, they can pay sufficient dollars and vacation trips to our greedy, lobby driven government and get what they want in most cases.
“Are they going to card you at Starbucks?”
Everyone knows that Starbucks sells coffee and coffee contains caffeine.
Caramel coated popcorn doesn’t ever have caffeine in it unless someone goes out of there way to add it.
So what is your point?
And then we have someone post as an advocate for coffee, even though they are physically addicted to it.
And they say moderation won;t hurt you.
Well then why the hell are you addicted to a chemical that gives you headaches when you don’t have it, and keeps you dehydrated when you don’t even know it?
For what purpose? So you can more easily use your dumb fingers to type words to communicate your dumb thoughts?
What is wrong with labeling a doughnut “warning, there is absolutely no reason to put caffeine in this product, but we did it anyway because we can (ps caffeine is physically addictive)”
And expect 12 year olds to make good choices even given that information.
I am against a nanny state, but this issue is about predatory marketing and sales.
Caffeine is not benign.
At least until the physical and neurological effects of caffeine on young people are better understood, I absolutely support limiting their access to caffeine.
Caffeine isn’t inherently evil, but just as we protect youngsters from alcohol and tobacco until they are (theoretically) old enough to make responsible choices in the use of these products, we should protect them from caffeine.
I consider this to be the most responsible thing the FDA has done in years; decades, even.