Drinking MonaVie is Not Equal to Eating 13 Fruits |
19 Comments |
I think a significant case can be made that new reports are being made. It didn’t take me long to find a number of swine flu ones on Twitter that were less than few days old.
As recently as last September we have “monavieteam” saying: “At first his body might not react like it is suppose because no body are used to 13 fruits per day (4oz). But Id say try it for more than 1 week.. and from there you’ll have a better idea about all this.” (source).
This is a direct result of MonaVie saying: “Delivers the antioxidant capacity of approximately 13 servings of fruits and vegetables in just four ounces.” (source)
However, if you ask MonaVie’s Product Specialist Sarah Brown has gone on record as saying:
“By consuming four ounces, you receive the approximate ORAC equivalent of 5 to 13 servings of commonly eaten fruit and vegetables. Please understand this refers to the antioxidant value (ORAC) and not to specific vitamins, minerals or other nutrients your body needs. Different fruits and vegetables have different ORAC values. If you drink 4 ounces of MonaVie it could be comparable to eating 5 fruits or vegetables with high ORAC values or 13 with lower ORAC vales.”
(Source: MonaVie Archive Comment #472)
Note, you never see someone quote the 5 number in the range that MonaVie officially states. It’s always the top end of the range. It’s another case of MonaVie distributors obscuring information to make the product seem better than it is.
It’s important to note that antioxidant capacity in this case is measure in ORAC units. MonaVie is referring to the 5,000 ORAC units in 4oz of MonaVie (though MonaVie lies as their scientists show it has about half that amount). They’ve translated 5,000 ORAC units to some combination of 13 fruits (which combination of fruits this is unknown). According to the USDA, two grams of ground cinnamon (see “Total-ORAC, umol TE/100g, 267,536″ on page 28 of the PDF report) has more than the “antioxidant capacity of 13 fruits.” By this measure, the $1.99 bottle that I have in my spice rack has approximately 32 days worth of “antioxidant capacity”. A year’s worth would cost me around $24 instead of $2400 of MonaVie. Clearly MonaVie’s logic of using “antioxidant capacity” is flawed… or if you accept it, you’ll save your money and buy cinnamon.
MonaVie is negligent for not putting a disclaimer in there saying that drinking 4oz. of MonaVie is not equivalent to eating 13 fruits. This is a mistake we’ve seen a dozens of times before. (Here’s another example if you don’t believe me.)
Originally posted 2009-05-14 15:34:02.
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September 1st, 2009 at 8:44 pm
… this strikes me as just another pyramid scheme, like… cookie lee jewelry or bernie madoff enterprises. put it in pretty packaging, dress it up in a bow, it is still a multilevel marketing scheme. buyer beware
January 6th, 2010 at 1:30 pm
think about where you work now… ITS A PYRAMID!!! ALL jobs today are technically ‘pyramid schemes’ However, MonaVie gives you the chance, if you put the time and effort into it to pass your ‘upline’ its not a pyramid… learn your facts…
January 6th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
Umm, if you work at a restaurant, you don’t have to start scrubbing floors or washing dishes to be the manager or top chef. You insert yourself into the “work pyramid” by having education and experience. Restaurants typically have more chefs than dishwashers… it’s not a structure where there are fewer high-paying chef jobs than lower-paying dishwasher jobs.
Can I take some kind of placement exam and be Ruby MonaVie distributor?
Sorry, but it’s a bad analogy.
Simply look at the number of people at the various levels in the income disclosure statement. You can clearly see that there are fewer of the people at the higher payout levels.
January 21st, 2010 at 6:05 am
monavie scam cant and doesnt want to learn the facts, he has his little mind made already.
January 21st, 2010 at 10:10 am
Already?!?! I’ve been researching the juice for over two years (well people have been flooding me with research of the juice) and all those facts lead to the same place.
Let me where I’m wrong on any of the facts on this website and I’ll post a correction.
January 27th, 2010 at 1:24 pm
I am not sure of the reliability of wikipedia,
anybody can edit on there.
January 27th, 2010 at 3:34 pm
. MonaVie is not and never was meant to be a vitamin supplement, nor a source of significant proteins or omega- 3 fatty acids.
We are not an ORAC drink either, albeit this aspect is of significant importance and is becoming more widely understood by the public. ORAC values come from many phytonutrients. You will see other products marketed primarily on their touted ORAC values. But, here again the scientific literature is telling us a much bigger story than simply ORAC. It is precisely because MonaVie has 19 fruits that it is more effective, more powerful, more balanced, than any single fruit product, or even the Acai mixed with chocolate. Yeah, chocolate has high ORAC as well, but tens of thousands of scientific papers tell us it is the higher amounts of mixed fruits, wide varieties, whole fruits….this is key, not one fruit mixed with some other ingredient
January 27th, 2010 at 4:20 pm
Wikipedia is widely considered an accurate source because it’s editors are very, very good about not letting just anyone’s changes stick if they are bad. What fact in Wikipedia do you argue, that the ORAC of ground cinnamon is extremely high? I’m sure you can verify that in any number of sources, I just took the easiest. Feel free to debate that fact with your own sources, but at least make sure they are unbiased like Wikipedia and not on some acai berry or MonaVie website.
V8 Fusion and other Tropicana juices also have a number and variety of fruits, so one would assume that it’s as “powerful” and “balanced” than MonaVie, and it generally costs $4 for some 40+ ounces, not $45 for some 25 ounces. V8 Fusion even adds vegetables which is variety that MonaVie doesn’t have. That would make it more “powerful” and “balanced” (if we use variety as a benchmark) than MonaVie and hence a much better purchase for about 1/10th or 1/20th the cost (ounce for ounce) to the consumer.
January 30th, 2010 at 4:43 pm
dear sir or madam;
you state that; According to Wikipedia, two grams of ground cinnamon has more than the “antioxidant capacity of 13 fruits.” yet when one click on that link i.e., ground cinnamon there is nothing about cinnamon, only info about fruits and their antioxidants that we know is important and supports monavie’s point “click; Food Serving size Antioxidant capacity per serving size[6]
Small Red Bean ½ cup dried beans 13727
Wild blueberry 1 cup 13427
Red kidney bean ½ cup dried beans 13259
Pinto bean ½ cup 11864
Blueberry 1 cup (cultivated berries) 9019
Cranberry 1 cup (whole berries) 8983
Artichoke hearts 1 cup, cooked 7904
Blackberry 1 cup (cultivated berries) 7701
Prune ½ cup 7291
Raspberry 1 cup 6058
Strawberry 1 cup 5938
Red Delicious apple 1 apple 5900
Granny Smith apple 1 apple 5381
Pecan 1 oz 5095
Sweet cherry 1 cup 4873
Black plum 1 plum 4844
Russet potato 1, cooked 4649
Black bean ½ cup dried beans 4181
Plum 1 plum 4118
Gala apple 1 apple 3903
January 30th, 2010 at 5:40 pm
Please note the date of when I published this article: “Originally posted 2009-05-14 15:34:02″
Here is the document that at the time said that Cinnamon has a 267,536 ORAC score per 100 grams.
It is not my fault that for some reason the other source changed their data. I’ve changed the link to reference the USDA study of ORAC scores… a source that is much more trustworthy.
Thanks!
January 31st, 2010 at 12:26 am
Robin,
How does the info you posted support MonaVie’s point? Each item that you listed easily beats the ORAC value of 4 oz. of MonaVie, which is 2,698 umoles.
January 31st, 2010 at 8:14 am
I figured it was Robin just posting a correction, which I appreciate. I should have used the USDA as a source instead of Wikipedia.
I couldn’t find an explanation on why ground cinnamon was taken out of Wikipedia. Maybe someone found it unfair to include something that has no water (spices) to something that is mostly water (fruit) when using weight as your guide. Of course comparing freeze-dried acai is unfair for the same reason.
February 3rd, 2010 at 8:51 am
Hi, I would like to say that your information is very good and unbiased. YES in is a MLM pyramid, but it is NOT an illegal scam. the MLM scams are when you pocket the “sign up” money for yourself. This is not like that I don’t think. I do agree with you about your facts, and that this drink ISN’T any better then V8 or anything like that. Can people make money of this?? sure! Will it be easy to convince “LIE” to your family and friends to spend MORE money then NEEDED to have a “HEALTHY DRINK”? NO!! Are there people out there who like to spend more money for a “LABEL”?? yes there is… but are you going to sell only to rich people you can afford this drink on a DAILY BASIS!!
[Editor's note: The rest of the comment is deleted as an off-topic sales pitch by Kevin for other MLM services.]
February 3rd, 2010 at 9:13 am
You are referring to business of MonaVie not being an illegal scam. I’m not claiming that it is (though others do). I’m not really concerned about if people can make money from it, though it looks like a vast majority do not as MonaVie appears to be embarrassed by their income disclosure statement.
February 3rd, 2010 at 9:17 am
No not saying you did. Just stating my opinion to all who are interested in this business idea… I absolutely agree with everything you’ve stated on here!!
February 3rd, 2010 at 9:30 am
The link now provided by MonaVie Scam to the USDA study of ORAC scores is appreciated.
However, here is the current link to Wikipedia’s page on cinnamon: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinnamon
As to the antioxidant capacity of cinnamon, this Wikipedia article states
February 23rd, 2010 at 3:06 am
Have you made an attempt to contact Monavie and see what the deal is between what seems to be, and what they promote?
I’m very interested, I drink MV and will continue to, regardless of the findings. Nonetheless though, please let me know if you have attempted to contact Monavie about this.
February 23rd, 2010 at 11:06 pm
Actually MonaVie reached out to me. I’ve had conversations with MonaVie’s chief blogger Shante Schroeder. They know of my site and are free to comment on it like anyone else. They have chosen not to comment which I think speaks volumes.
June 24th, 2010 at 6:04 pm
Below you will find the explanation why the report which critics of MV put so much weight on published in Men’s Health Journal is flawed for products containing acai.
It comes from one the latest studies:
“Anti-oxidant capacities of flavonoid compounds isolated from acai pulp”. Kang et al published in Food Chemistry 122 (2010)
It confirms what I said in another place about other things being responsible for acai features and benefits that cannot be measured easily.
“Anthocyanins and proanthocyanidins are considered major anti-oxidants in fruits, but their concentrations are relatively low in acai (Schauss et al., 2006b). The contributions of the anthocyanins to the overall anti-oxidant capacities of acai were estimated to be only approximately 10% (Lichtenthäler et al., 2005). A recent paper also suggested that the components other than anthocyanins in acai contributed to antiproliferative activity against C-6 rat brain the major polyphenols in acai (Gallori et al., 2004; Schauss et al., 2006b). Many studies have demonstrated that flavonoids have
strong anti-oxidant activities and anti-inflammatory properties (Beara et al., 2009; Leong et al., 2010; Li et al., 2009). However, very few studies have determined the anti-oxidant capacity of individual polyphenol compounds found in acai pulp. There is only one
study that has primarily studied lignans (Chin, Chai, Keller, & Kinghorn, 2008).
On the other hand, due to given limitations in analytical procedures, flavonoids have only been tentatively identified by HPLC or mass spectrometric methods, resulting in many flavonoids in the pulp remaining unidentified, much less determined for possible bioactivity.
Therefore, the first objective of this study was to identify the major flavonoid compounds in acai pulp. Systemic isolation and fractionation in freeze-dried acai pulp is being reported in this paper. Seven flavones and their C-glycosides were obtained from
freeze-dried acai pulp and their structures were elucidated by NMR, MS and the results compared to the literature. Among them, two compounds were identified in acai pulp for the first time.
The vast majority of studies that assess anti-oxidant capacities of acai and other anti-oxidant rich fruits and berries have utilised chemical-based assays. Unfortunately, such assays do not reflect or correlate with the test item’s cellular response.
The second objective of this study was to evaluate the anti-oxidant capacities of these flavonoids with one chemical-based assay and two cellbased assays: ORAC, CAP-e assay and ROS PMN assay. By doing these additional assays, we hope to understand not only their in vitro anti-oxidant capacities, but also their behaviours in living cells to reduce oxidative stress.”