When the U.S. 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines were released earlier this year, one of the key recommendations for a healthy eating pattern stated that individuals should consume less than 10 percent of calories a day from added sugars. To help consumers achieve this recommendation, beverage formulators are turning to natural sweeteners like stevia, erythritol and monk fruit as a way to cut calories and improve taste in non-alcohol drinks.

Nearly 2 billion adults worldwide qualified as overweight in 2014, and 600 million as obese, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), while the American Diabetes Association reports that 1.4 million Americans are diagnosed with diabetes each year.