Pros & Cons of Goji Juice
A web search into the pros and cons of goji juice reveals many claimed pros and few cons. The reason for so many pros is that many of the sites on this topic are from who sell or distribute this product. This does not mean that the claimed pros are all untrue, nor that there are no cons. Does this Spark an idea?
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What is Goji?
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Such an exotic name indicates an exotic product. Goji is another name for Chinese wolfberry. It comes from two closely-related species, Lycium barbarum and L. chinense, both from the family Solanaceae, which includes the potato, tomato, eggplant, chili plant and tobacco. Its ellipsoid, 1cm to 2cm long, bright orange-red berry was used for thousands of years in China for medicinal purposes. Now, some advertisers hail it as "the biggest discovery in nutrition in the last 40 years."
Himalayan Goji Juice
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Wolfberry has been marketed in the West as a health food since the early 20th century. Goji juice started to gain popularity after Canadian-American writer and nutritionist Earl Mindell learned about the goji berry in the Himalayas. He decided to create a juice to bring its benefits to the West. He partnered with Free Life International, a multi-level marketing company founded in 1995 and based in Connecticut. In February of 2007, Mindell was inducted into the California Pharmacy Hall of Fame.
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The Real and Claimed Pros
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One advertiser lists at least 38 benefits of goji juice. These include countering premature aging, regulating blood pressure, making you look and feel younger, preventing cancer, regulating weight and blood sugar, helping memory and digestion, alleviating dry cough and enhancing libido and sexual functions. No scientific evidence is presented, even if some of the claims about being rich in certain vitamins and minerals are proven, though not necessarily in amounts that surpass other fruits.
The Few Cons
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The biggest con about goji juice is that it is expensive at a retail price of $50 for a 30 fluid ounce bottle. There have also been complaints about goji causing gout or being too toxic, and quite a number complaining about this or that claim not being true, an offshoot perhaps of too many good things being claimed by the marketers. It is also a possibility some complaints are competition-generated. At the very least, though, goji juice is not known and not likely to have negative impacts on health.
Marketing Under Scrutiny
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If there exists such a term for a product as being "over-marketed," this would probably best describe goji juice. This is not in the sense that it has been offered widely or advertised extensively but rather that it has been claimed to have too many health benefits without showing scientific evidence. These claims have been so far-reaching that they have had to come under the scrutiny of the Food Standards Agency in Europe and the Food and Drug Administration in the United States.
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