“The shipping bill of lading from November 2008 (#MAEU857273697) shows that EarthFruits received a large shipment containing drums of solids originating from Balboa, Panama (a port city located at the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal) and arriving in Los Angeles.”

The shipper was Bela Iaca Ind. E Com. Polpas de Frutas Ltda. [translation; Beautiful Acai Fruit Pulps Ltd.]. Bela Iaca Ltd (located in Castanhal, Brazil) was founded in 2003 and manufactures fruit purees that are shipped to buyers worldwide. Their products include acai puree (available in 180 kg drums) as well as bacuri, cacau, camu-camu, cupuaçu, acerola, passion fruit, pineapple, guava, cashew, taperebá, soursop, lime, muruci, uxi, and mango.

A search for other bills of lading from Bela Iaca uncovered a shipment (#MAEU853684299) on February 23, 2007 of 260 drums (roughly 25 tons) of “frozen acai refined and pasteurized with 12% solids added with citric acid”. This shipment was also to Los Angeles and originated in Panama. The receiver of the shipment was…[drum roll please]…MONARCH HEALTH SCIENCES (now doing business as Monavie LLC).

Note also that the manufacturer specifies that the acai is only 12% solids, which represents lowto mid-grade acai (Type B). The same company also offers higher-grade versions, which apparently Monavie LLC was too cheap to pay for. These include a version that contains more than 14% acai solids (Type A) as well as an even higher-grade organic version.”

So here we have a forensic trail that tells us pretty much exactly how and where Monavie really gets (or got) their acai. As I [Vogel] speculated a long while back, they purchase cheap frozen acai pulp in 180 kg drums from an unaffiliated non-exclusive bulk supplier in Brazil. The drums of acai puree are then shipped by slow boat to Panama, where it is unloaded and transferred to another ship for slow transport to Los Angeles. After arriving in LA, the drums of acai puree are shipped overland by truck to the bottling facility in Utah. Monavie LLC has nothing to do with the harvesting or processing of the acai berries and they aren’t freeze-dried within 24-48 hours of picking.

Of course the big take-away here is in that last paragraph. MonaVie distributors like to say that MonaVie is there harvesting the acai. This is obviously not true. They like to say that they get the best quality acai. Again, the company they buy from has better quality available. MonaVie distributors like to say that MonaVie is there freeze-drying the acai to keep it fresh. That doesn’t seem to be the case either.

Huh, so how about those berries?