Dive Brief:

• The use of new ingredients or alternative proteins to meet consumer demands for clean labels creates texture and stability challenges, leading to design constraints. Food Ingredients First interviewed TIC Gums about its line of clean label hydrocolloid systems for texture and stability of food and beverage products.
• When replacing ingredients, formulators must build functionalities back in, many times using a combination of hydrocolloids to do so.
• Manufacturers walk a fine line in order to meet customer requirements as well as meeting product development goals.

Dive Insight:

"For us at TIC Gums, it's not just about the eating experience anymore, it's more than just taste and texture and making sure its stable through its shelf life," said Greg Andon, CEO, TIC Gums. "It's still those things, but now it's also about being organic, non-GMO, natural and also how the customer defines what these things are."

Clean label demands makes this the optimum time for exploration and innovation for solutions.

According to BCC Research, the increased demand from end-users is behind the expansion of the global hydrocolloid market, which has grown at a rate averaging over 3% in the recent years. The company predicts the market will reach nearly $8.2 billion in 2020, up from $6.6 billion in 2015, for a CAGR of 4.4%.