Artemis International, an ingredients supplier specializing in dark berry extracts for functional foods and supplements and owner of the Berryceuticals brand, recently announced the launch of BerryDefense Immune Blend, a proprietary formula designed for immune support and other multi-faceted issues that have been high priorities in recent times, cardiovascular and eye health.
 
While black elderberry is already well-known for its immune support properties, BerryDefense combines European black elderberry with highly standardized extracts of Aronia and blackcurrant. The added benefits of these two botanical extracts include clinical studies which have found that these two fruits have antiviral properties, and clinical evidence suggesting that chokeberry supplementation could reduce blood pressure and cholesterol levels, and that blackcurrant is clinically evidenced to improve multiple metrics of vision health.
 
Beyond the compounds unique to each of the berries in this supplement, this extract is potent in flavonoids, which are also associated with a number of wellness benefits including immune support.
 
The boom in immune support products has created unprecedented growth for black elderberry supplements, Artemis reports. The immune support market on the whole has grown just short of 50% over 2019, and it is expected that cold, flu, and immune supplement sales will reach $5 billion in 2020, providing plenty of challenge and competition in keeping up with demand for familiar and novel immune ingredients. Black elderberry sales have increased 126% in the natural market and 241% in the mainstream market, according to reporting by the American Botanical Council, Nutrition Business Journal, and SPINS market research.
 
“After experiencing record demand for our ElderCraft extracts, we wanted to meet the ongoing needs of our finished product customers, and consumers, with an ingredient that reaches beyond the benefits of black elderberry,” Leslie Gallo, president of Artemis International, said. “With our BerryDefense blend, black elderberry is combined with other clinically-validated anti-viral ingredients to offer a flavonoid-packed immune powerhouse that also provides other significant benefits during the COVID pandemic. Despite the incredible demand for elderberry-based products, Artemis International has been working hard this year to ensure we can supply our customers. And now we are in the traditional cold and flu season, on top of the COVID pandemic, requiring even more supply. We are doing all we can to satisfy our customers’ requirements.”