The nutritional profile of V 3.0 is as calculated as ever, you have all of our customer loyalty based on that. But probiotics seem to be an additive that doesn’t apply (IMO) to the majority of users and what the goal of HUEL at its core. I would much prefer a basic version w/o the probiotic added.
Unless I’m wrong, the goal of HUEL is to provide the body with whole food, complete nutrition. It is attractive based on the idea that it provides Everything you need, nothing you don’t.
Probiotics (although beneficial for SOME) falls into the category of supplemental medicine based towards addressing gut-based immune ailments.If a customer is dealing with a microbiome issue, it should be their choice to follow a regime to correct that imbalance. W/o diving into the worm hole of probiotic science, it has not been proven to be effective as a preventative measure or as digestive aid. From what I can tell, probiotics are effective as a balancing agent to help improve gut-based deficiencies, and even then, the broad spectrum of different strains is a messy world of trying to match individual microbiome deficiencies to their needed counterparts of various probiotic strains.
If digestive aid is the intention, perhaps you could offer a separate additive pack (kind of a “probiotic boost”) as an optional add in for those who feel they could benefit from it. You already have the formula, just separate it and offer as mix-in packet. Either that or just use a fermented pea protein/brown rice protein blend and add digestive bioavailability the natural way…
Still a loyal customer, But would prefer a less “disruptive” formula. Maybe it’s just me?
Hi there! I’m sorry to hear that you are running into difficulties with probiotics.
Probiotics are included in Huel v3.0 powder and Huel Black Edition as a result of their possible benefits to our gut health! We explain a bit more here about this.
I think your idea about having a separate pouch is great! However, unfortunately, this would not be feasible for us as we are a food company and not a supplement company.
This is my original point. Huel is a Food company (and one that I support btw) why Are probiotics supplemented into the “food” from the start? I’m guessing this addition was added to Target the percentage of customers who experience the digestive upset that huel sometimes causes, unfortunately I think the unproven science behind probiotics is likely to cause a good amount of digestive upset for many people itself, effectively canceling out the benefit while going through the trouble to complicate the formula. Fermentation and/or sprouting the potential trigger foods (pea, rice, flaxseed) would help that as well without introducing more potential sources of inflammation.
Thank you for your response though, appreciate the company and your user-interaction culture.
I agree with the concern. Probiotic supplements are unproven to be of any benefit. There are innumerable types of bacteria that occur naturally in the gut of someone who is eating properly. Probiotic supplements provide whatever bacteria the manufacturer deems appropriate, which may but probably has little to no correlation to what is needed for any specific individual’s digestive health.
Regarding evidence you will always find trials supporting or rejecting something as a conclusion. With the right design you can “demonstrate” almost everything. And absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, btw.
I would prefer it if Huel kept adding probiotics to the powder. If someone does not want them he can still use another Huel product and not one of the powders. Or use another meal replacement - the market is really huge and there are tons of products without probiotics.
Huel including probiotics doesn’t bother me. However, it is much easier for the people that do want probiotics to take a supplement than it is for the people that don’t want them to find an alternative to huel. For that reason, if there are enough customers that don’t want them I would suggest removing them from the product.
I don’t know anything about the research into probiotics, but I can think of more reasons for studies to be conducted in a biased manner supporting the purchase of probiotics than not. In other words, there’s no profit in claiming probiotics don’t do anything. The market is really huge after all.
I have had a lot of huel both before and after the addition of probiotics. The additions of probiotics in huel did not reduce the farting is causes whatsoever. It also did not alter my stools in any way. It also did not affect my mood. I can’t tell that adding the probiotics did anything positive or negative for me personally.
There are plenty of alternatives without probiotics. I would even say that it is relatively hard to find a meal replacement containing probiotics. I appreciate that Huel adds them.