Takeaways from blog post (save you reading it all!)

·         Organic isn’t necessary what it seems, so don’t rush into thinking its better somehow

·         As each plant or animal is different, being all organic, given the rule of increased cost seems like a strange choice unless you are convinced by your own research.  My research certainly didn’t give that results!

·         Like many aspects of life, organic is a balancing act. Get it right for you. If you don’t know something, how can you have an approach to suits you? Find the details that will help you formulate a view to stand by.

Why Talk Organic?

This may seem a bit off piste, but stick with me here.

Talking Organic wouldn’t be something a brand like to Hence would normally approach.

Mainly due to their products being 99% - not remotely organic.

Also, many in this position would be concerned mentioning Organic might give the game away, let the cat out the bag, or just show, actually, its not been thought about!

Because, as we all know, organic generally means more expensive…

So, lets approach the sticky issue.  Many (previously self-included) don’t really understand Organic in all areas.  Or more specifically for this post, what organic means for the mass-produced products, highly processed products we buy, as well as the extracts for supplements like our Stacks.

1st things 1st…

The elephant in the room with Organic is cost.  It’s fair to say almost everyone associates Organic products as costlier than non. 

Step into a supermarket as a reference - Organic will be pricey. 

An Organic bag of potatoes, for example, is 3 times the price of everything else, and because marketing teams like us the draw correlations with certain ideas, they probably havn’t been cleaned either, so with your spuds, you get a load of free mud – because it’s Organic! 

The “Why more £££?” has been pushed on us to be because it’s somehow higher quality, or expensive to produce because certain aspects are better, somehow? 

Grown somehow with more care perhaps?

Think about that?  Are Organic farmers somehow better people?  Loving every green shoot as it comes out the ground.

The reality is in the main part – most farm (vegetables, fruits, Meats, Daily etc) are simply not set up organically.  What this means is the whole supply chain is set around non-organic and so becoming organic is a conscious change to be made not just a standard.

What is Organic?

So before rush off to our soap boxes and rant about unsustainable non-organic produce, ask yourself, do you know what it means and fully understand?

Organic means grown without pesticides or GM, correct?

So, what helps these plants etc. grow?  Is organic just planted and harvested when ready??  Nothing added to help growth, speed up the process or increase yield?

Obviously there a huge number of techniques and new ones coming about all the time, but do we know the answers to these questions? Even roughly enough to have a broad opinion?

When you go buy something and there is an organic alternative, can you say you know why it’s better and worth the extra cost, or not?

I can honestly say like most, I didn’t think about and still don’t know all the answers.  How can ! with hundreds of production methods, millions of farms, farmers, suppliers etc.  I have no idea what makes it “organic” or not.  So how do you choose?

Finally, the “meat” of the issue

Organic in many cases simply means grown with other “organic sources”.

So Green vegetables for example (topically) would be grown with manure rather a pesticide.  From other plants, animals (most common) or humans (2nd most common source of manure – our poop). 

Meat & dairy is the same, grown with organic feeds. It also means no antibiotics or hormone injections as well as time spend outdoors and space to live comfortably. 

Is the grass & feed the Organic cow eats organic? Has the land ever had pesticides, because these pesticides can stay in soil for years and have an extended half-life in water systems, plants and animals. (1)

Hang on, go back one, is the manure organic for growing those Greens?  Some is Human!  Are they Organic?

See the problem yet?

You could say “oh you’re getting silly now!” but consider most of what the body doesn’t what, it gets rid of out the back door.  If we are fed on non-organic plants and animals, are we an organic source? We have antibiotics, we wouldn’t be organic meat!

In the same thought, a waste product (manure) is full of nutrients (what the body didn’t need at the time) but also full of nastiness it didn’t want.  Organic uses “uncleaned” waste, often sprayed on leaves, we then eat! 

Is that that so much better than a pesticide?  Keep in mind we have been eating and drinking these pesticides for a LONG time too.

This area gets more and more complicated, so much work, time and journalism has been spent here… it’s not worth going much deeper on.

I’d suggest (and this is kind of the point by the end of this post, you go away and make a much better educated decision for yourself!!)

Ethical discussion

I want to cover this briefly, as it’s a tough and messy area.  Vegan’s are everywhere these days and I’m not looking to p*ss any off.

With Ethical reasoning, unfortunately, comes feasibility.  Marketers realised quickly, if your ethics rule over your decisions, you will go deep into your pocket to stand by them.

For this reason, its not really a fair fight.

So, for many it’s what can we afford or justify to pay for in this unknown world of “to be organic or not”…

Anyway!

Organic has been twisted, it’s now a niche marketing technique, not a description of produce.  In fact, there are early case of trademark’s or the word “Organic” so it can be used as a brand really than a description. (2)

Along with my point above in capitals, I want to share my view, and how I chose to design Hence Stacks. 

Now on this point, Greens Stacks, organic or not…

As I mentioned at the beginning, this not an area most of Hence competitors would discuss, unless of course they have chosen to be an all organic product.  In which case, the product may be either expensive (in my thinking, unnecessarily) or just not a good enough product (as there is not enough of the really great Phytonutrients in there to be viable).

Of the 13 natural ingredients that make up greens stack…

1 is organic.  Spinach leaf extract

With good reason.  With the cost-to-benefits balancing act.

1.       The muddying of water between organic and not (literally!) is too blurred.  I could never say an ingredient is truly Organic for the potential benefits vs risks. Also, trusting the supply chain if I went looking for it would be tricky.  So, all the generic arguments for and against go out the window.  We basically get what we are given.

2.       The commercial extraction process for the majority if plants, roots and algae’s is without care or consideration to organic or otherwise.  Little research is paired with the additional benefits or issues at this level.  We know a lot of the synthetic pesticides etc are water delivery and borne, and as extracts loose the water aspect, some studies suggest this aspect is lost in the process. 

So, the high additional cost is based on limited research, and expectancy.  Then the feasibility comes into it.  We couldn’t overspend, but I wouldn’t compromise on ingredients.  The judgement call is on lesser “organic” ingredients for same cost (with limited benefits, and fewer study proven benefits as a result.)  Or what we ended up with, the best, proven ingredients with no compromise on benefits and health, with 100’s of cited human studies back up, what we consider the best phytonutrients and adaptogenic ingredients for synergistic benefit and results.

3.       Spinach is a very fast growing “super absorber”. Studies show “organic spinach to be grown slower and therefore higher micro-nutrient density” a plant that is particularly known to absorb everything it is fed, would be pertinent to consider organic at least. Consider we use the leaf only.  This had a feeling of “doing the honourable thing”.  Where media is strong and science is thin, its best to air on the side of caution with a small increase in raw material cost.

4.       Many of the other ingredients are much less prone to this specific areas of issue.  Take broccoli sprouts, the young broccoli as it just comes out the ground.  We have discussed the issues with ground contamination.  Barely worth needing organic.  Same goes with Spirulina (water grown, contamination potential), Maca, the components of Dang gui Buxue Tang, curcuma, Kale (takes for more nutrients from the soil than Spinach) etc.

As you can hopefully tell now, each ingredient is carefully considered.  Cost vs benefits vs proof.

And not just Organic saw a factor. 

Next time the Phytonutrient & adaptogen explainer.

Luke

Takeaways

·         Organic isn’t necessary what it seems, so don’t rush into thinking its better somehow

·         As each plant or animal is different, being all organic, given the rule of increased cost seems like a strange choice unless you are convinced by your own research.  My research certainly didn’t give that results!

·         Like many aspects of life, organic is a balancing act. Get it right for you. If you don’t know something, how can you have an approach to suit you? Find the details that will help you formulate a view to stand by.

Some additional interesting facts around Organic

·         Proven on multiple occasions to be no taste difference in a variety of cases and samples (3). Appearance is where the biggest difference is, due to the speed of growth, non-organic produce can be much more uniform and larger.

·         There is no such thing as Organic seafood.  Mainly because of what we put in the Ocean! (4)

·         Processed food named Organic is more of a Legal process and marketing law than in formulation.  The time and money isn’t spend ensuring the source raw product is Organic… (5)

·         Pesticides have links to cancer but not proven to cause in the dosage we ingest in extracts, processed or raw whole foods. In the same thought, they are now pretty much everywhere… so don’t think this a reason to jump to Organic! (6)

·         Myth – the fatty acid make up of milk and meats is different due to organic or not.  Has nothing to do with Organic and everything to do with the type of food the animal is fed, corn fed for example has a different Omega 3/6 ratio than grass fed. Not organic. (7)

·         Myth – Organic meals and milks are somehow Nitrate reduced, again nothing to do with Organic! (8)

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