Efforts to lower the calorie counts in beverages have helped spark a number of innovations from many facets of the industry, including equipment manufacturers. As more beverage-makers look to take down the calories in their products through sweetener blend formulations, suppliers of processing automation equipment also are working to develop equipment to handle these new formats.
“The beverage industry is facing a whole new set of challenges: unique and expensive ingredients; more complex recipes and sweetener blends; shorter production runs; ingredient variability; and ultimately product quality issues — even [Food and Drug Administration (FDA)] regulations,” says Matt Glicken, vice president of sales and marketing for Wilmette, Ill.-based SensiBlend.