Stevia’s main drawback is that it isn’t sufficient as an all-natural intense sweetener when used by itself. It works best when blended with other sweeteners, but can’t use the ‘all-natural’ claim if blended with so-called artificial sweeteners.
This, it turns out, could be a blessing. Consumers don’t yet quite believe that they can have an all-natural, zero-calorie drink, but they do believe that regular products can be naturally improved to give a lower calorie content.
This emphatically wasn’t the case a few years ago, when various companies tried mid-calorie products. At the time, they had to depend on artificial sweeteners.
I wonder if it’s possible that regular carbonates could migrate to lower calorie positions over the next few years. Or will the scientists have come up with a competitive natural sweetener that works as well without any calories at all?
Viable, certainly. Enviable, probably.
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