[PepsiCo sign and Damian Browne]
Damian Browne (interview): “We’re definitely in a transformation period right now, but we have been working on natural colors for years.”
[Browne entering color research labs]
Damian Browne (interview): “We have seen though, in more recent times, that consumers are looking for more natural or less artificial ingredients.”
[Powder food dye and food dye in liquids]
Damian Browne (interview): “We’re moving from an artificial to an agricultural raw material supply chain.”
[Carrots used to make natural food dyes]
Damian Browne (interview): “And just think, if you go into your produce aisle in your grocery store, have a think about what are the colors that you’re seeing there? I mean, there’s lots of reds and yellows. Not many blues, you’ll probably notice. So we’ve got a finite amount of material to start working from. Then there’s only a finite number of material that’s regulatory compliant in whatever country that we’re putting it in. So we got those limitations. I think then you have to think about, well, how do we grow these? Let’s take carrot, for example. This is a nice example because carrots come as a yellow, orange and black carrots. So we can get different colors from the same carrot. We have to first grow these. So now we get into an agricultural space where we probably weren’t in an agricultural space before. And then we have to procure 18 months ahead. Or so we have grow these, put them into a farm and cultivate them. We then have to process that color pigment out so we go through a process to extract that color out. And there’s natural variability within that color. Remember, it’s a natural crop. So we get like a lot to lot. or season to season, variability. And then we’re hoping it’s always going to be consistent.”
[Beets used to make natural food dyes]
[Sweet potatoes used to make natural food dyes]
Damian Browne (interview): “Obviously, with a carrot, you could just even imagine that it comes with an inherent flavor. So we have to really think how use that carrot and what brand. And then we have an incredible flavor team. And our flavor team can look at whatever flavor that we’re working on, rebalance the flavor to account for one of these inherent that comes in with that.”
[Natural red food dye]
[Artificial red food dye]
[Browne showing two glasses of water, one with natural red dye and one with artificial red dye]
[Natural orange food dye and artificial orange food dye]
[Browne showing two glasses of water with natural and artificial dyes, explaining their color difference]
[Natural yellow food dye and artificial yellow food dye]
[Browne showing two glasses of water, one with natural dye from carrots and one with artificial dye]
[Food dyes]
Damian Browne (interview): “And then finally, I think we have to commercialize all this material. So it’s all well and good sitting on a bench and getting a small extract. But we have work really closely with our suppliers to get the amount of color that we need. To be able to mass market all of this. And we have to scale this to much bigger and that comes in with its own inherent issues and problems that we have solve. So there’s a lot to think about when you think about like end to end from material all the way to the product. But look, this is why we all went to college to become scientists and engineers. So it’s a great opportunity for us to fix or to solve all these problems.”
[Food dyes]
This script was provided by The Associated Press.