Christopher Shade’s vast depth and breadth of knowledge, passion for healing, and intuitive understanding of chemistry and biology are reflected in Quicksilver Scientific’s detoxification protocols, supplement delivery systems, and patented mercury speciation test. Shade is a recognized expert on mercury and liposomal delivery systems. He has lectured and trained doctors in the U.S. and internationally on the subject of mercury, heavy metals, and the human detoxification system. Shade's current focus is on the development of cutting-edge, lipid-based delivery systems for nutraceuticals, such as liposomes and micro-emulsion systems, to address the growing need for high quality, affordable detoxification solutions.
 
Health E-Insights: Do your sales around Quicksilver Scientific immune support and anxiety relief products still have high interest?
 
Shade: The global COVID-19 crisis has led to an intense awareness of immune health and a huge demand for immune supporting products. The biggest demand has been for our Liposomal Vitamin C, Liposomal Glutathione and Nanoemulsified D3K2. 
 
Health E-Insights: Has such high immune product interest influenced a reshuffle of your product pipeline? 
 
Shade: There will be a global focus on immune health and immune products for at least the next two years. At Quicksilver Scientific, before the pandemic took hold, we had been heavily focused on anti-aging/longevity products, such as our NAD+ Gold launch, and mitochondrial products, such as The One. With this shift in international focus toward products that provide immune support, we are also shifting to fast-forward some of the immune products that were in our R&D pipeline, and also to develop others in response to this new demand. We are bringing an immune boosting shot forward that has vitamin C, elderberry, vitamin D, vitamin A, vitamin K, and vitamin E, altogether in one 12 ml oral dose. We are also bringing vitamin C with elderberry as a standalone product, which had been originally slated for Q3 but was released in Q2. We have brought together all of the most relevant immune boosting vitamins and herbals into one place and using our unique delivery system, we can get both water-soluble and fat-soluble compounds together into one product and greatly increase bioavailability. 
 
Health E-Insights: Explain the Quicksilver health system. 
 
Shade: The Quicksilver Delivery Systems signature trademark on our liposomal products sets them apart from other companies and ensures a superior product. By virtue of our smaller, more stable, single-layer spheres, made from the highest quality ingredients available, our liposomal delivery systems improve upon basic liposomal technology. The difference is literally clear–our liposomal products have a clarity that only can be achieved with liposomes that are small enough to pass between cells and enter the bloodstream directly, guaranteeing optimal bioavailability. Liposomes are microscopic single to multi-layer spheres made of phospholipids, the basic building blocks of cell membranes.
 
Phospholipids encapsulate a compound, such as glutathione, in order to bypass the digestive processes that normally degrade or limit the compound's absorption. Liposomes demonstrate the ability to cross the blood-brain barrier, deposit their cargo intracellularly, and enhance lymphatic circulation of therapeutic compounds. Additionally, the phospholipids that compose the liposome fuse with and feed the cell membranes. Providing phospholipids in this way ensures proper membrane function to facilitate the absorption of nutrients and the excretion of cellular waste products and toxins. In fact, phospholipid therapy, using both injectable forms and oral forms, has a long and solid clinical history for repair and maintenance of liver function, circulatory health, and neurological health.
 
At their highest expression, liposomes bring the power of intravenous therapy into a convenient oral delivery. However, all liposomes are not created equally. Most liposomes on the market use low grades of phospholipids, including raw lecithin, instead of the high-phosphatidylcholine phospholipid mixes necessary for a good liposome. Nutraceutical manufacturers also typically use cheap shear methods resulting in large 200-600nm, poorly-absorbed particles. Quicksilver Delivery Systems improves upon basic liposomal delivery technology with smaller, more stable, tightly distributed single-layer spheres, called unilamellar vesicles, made from the highest-grade ingredients available. These small vesicles begin absorbing as soon as they hit your mouth, so you can get high absorption before they are altered by the harsh processes in the intestines. Quicksilver Scientific uses the same high-tech equipment, rigorous processes, and tight particle size controls used by pharmaceutical companies. Look for the clear difference of Quicksilver Delivery Systems.
 
Health E-Insights: Has technology played a large role in your company’s business strategy?
 
Shade: Our bioavailability technologies are the foundation of everything we do at Quicksilver Scientific. We are using this bioavailability technology to realize the promise of nutraceuticals that often were not realized in the standard capsule formats. It also allows us to blend ingredients that were not easily blended and to work with formats such as functional beverages and oral dose formats solubilizing previously insoluble compounds into these liquids. 
 
Health E-Insights: You’ve streamlined your business process. How and why?
 
Shade: We have had to adapt to the current circumstances. We had to first respond to a greatly increased demand by increasing production. At the same time, we're dealing with managing the essentiality of our business, social distancing, and responsible management of staff. We are able to have a chunk of our employees work offsite. But for our employees that have to be on site, the ones who are running manufacturing and shipping, we broke the labor pool into two discrete teams that work opposing shifts and are never together at the same time. That way if someone on one of the teams contracts COVID-19, those people that work with them will have to be quarantined. That way we only lose one of the teams. The other team can keep working to maintain continuity. This also has less people on site at any one time. Now instead of working five days, we’re working seven days across two separate teams. So there is less density of workers and more isolation. And again, we have a bit of insurance that we don't lose everyone should there be a case of COVID-19. We also did a lot of cross training and built redundancy into the teams, so people can jump between teams if necessary. We had our outside counsel write an opinion letter for us, recognizing Quicksilver Scientific as an essential business. There are about five criteria and any one of them would have made us essential, and we met four of the five. We gave a copy of that opinion letter to each of our employees who have to travel to work and told them to keep it with them so they have it in case their travel is questioned. I have been tracking other states, such as California, which has been one of the states others are following, and had the opinion letter written even before the stay-at-home order was issued where we are located, in Boulder County.
 
Health E-Insights: What are the top two metrics to which your company pays the closest attention? 
 
Shade: We are looking at sales every month and at each channel and product and how those correlate with different events that we host or marketing that we do, or global health events like we are having now. We are able to pivot, we have agility on R&D, and manufacturing is all very agile, so we can pivot on a dime. The most difficult part is the global supply chain, getting ingredients or packaging in from Europe has been challenging because the carrier flights are not running. There was an immediate run on vitamin C and elderberry in the market, so the ingredients were hard to track down. We have redundant suppliers and have done our best. Again, agility is really important, and we will be able to cover our supply for both of those moving through the future. It did take a lot of coordinated effort with European and Asian suppliers and distributors here within the U.S. As soon as we saw it ramping up we started securing our supplies for all necessary ingredients. We have a pretty secure supply chain.
 
Health E-Insights: In this crazy world, as the curator of Quicksilver, what keeps you up at night?
 
Shade: In more peaceful times, I am always thinking about the next products and what is next in innovations. Then you find yourself in the middle of times like we have now. Now keeping production moving, keeping up with demand, and of course the health and safety of our employees, are the issues that are keeping me up at night. 
 
Health E-Insights: What makes you laugh?
 
Shade: While these are extremely serious times, humor keeps me going. I look at some of the posts by colleagues and customers and it makes me smile to see that levity in dark times is still acceptable, and welcome.

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Sheldon Baker is a senior member of Baker Dillon Group LLC and has created numerous nutraceutical brand marketing communications and public relations campaigns for many well-known supplement and food industry companies. For Health E-Insights interview consideration or brand marketing consulting, contact him at SBaker@BakerDillon.com.