Sweet Victory collaborates with Givaudan to develop chewing gum for children that helps curb cravings for sweets

Photo © iStockphoto.com/shironosov

Sweet Victory Ltd. (Ramat Yishai, Israel) is collaborating with Givaudan (Vernier, Switzerland) to create a flavorful botanical-infused chewing gum for children that is designed to curb cravings for sugary treats. Sweet Victory has already designed the gum for adults, but designing the gum for children has been more challenging. That’s why Givaudan helped the startup create a supplement that fit kid’s taste buds.

The gum stifles cravings by blocking sugar receptors on the tongue. According to Sweet Victory, the gum works within two minutes and can last up to two hours. During that time, sweet foods will taste bland, even sour, abating the binging of sweets. The development of the children’s version has been an extensive process, as Sweet Victory and Givaudan spent months designing a product that is child-safe, with tailored dosages of the active ingredient Gymenma sylvestre. The herb has been used traditionally for over 2000 years in Ayurvedic medicine.

The new gum will come in a tutti-frutti flavor, and Sweet Victory has already conducted trials with children to estimate the impact of the gum on children in Israel, France, and the U.S. Results showed that children enjoyed the gum, but could not eat confectionery products after chewing it because of the change to their receptors.

“The biggest challenge in developing this gum for kids was to create boldly fruit-flavored chewing gum to overcome the bitterness of the herb gymnema,” explained Shimrit Lev, co-founder of Sweet Victory, in a press release. “In the gum designed for adults we used strong mint, but in the kid’s product we had to come up with other solutions.”

“By producing a product so attractive to children that, regardless of its effect of blocking sweet taste, it can become a legitimate substitute for other sweets, simply because it's delicious,” said Gitit Lahav, co-founder of Sweet Victory. “We turned to Givaudan to help us with that challenge. As a flavor expert, using advanced technologies, they helped us refine the product and develop a very flavorful, yet highly effective product—a sweet treat that can change eating behavior and help parents control their kids’ daily sugar consumption.”