The diet of the western world is notoriously poor, with large segments of the population eating cheap, nutritionally inadequate meals as staples, and the fresh fruits, vegetables, and meats that we have evolved to thrive on being elbowed off our tables and relegated to expensive options reserved for those with the means to afford them. In their place, fast food, frozen dinners, and processed snacks have all too often become the go to for many people.
In this nutrient deficient reality, one of the simplest solutions that is becoming the default options for many people is adding to their diet vitamins and supplements to make up for what they lack. Within this thriving industry, MegaFood strives to provide its customers with the healthiest, bio-available options.
What Is MegaFood?
In 1973, MegaFood started in Derry, New Hampshire, USA. It was acquired by Carl E. Jackson in 1989, 27 years ago, and although now retired, was the leading voice in MegaFood's striving for excellence that has defined its existence. MegaFood works closely with a number of farms, which are equally committed to locally and ethically sourced fruits and vegetables in their mission to provide the most naturally and completely nourishing supplements available.
These farms are listed as Uncle Matt's, Stahlbush Island, James Lake Farms, Kauai Organic Farms, Lundberg Family Farms, Andrew Weil, M.D., Tieraona Low Dog, M.D., MegaFoodies, and Woolly Pocket.
In 2003, MegaFood partnered with the University of New Hampshire in an ongoing mission to establish and maintain the highest quality and most potently nutritional vitamins and supplements.
MegaFood went on to change its formulas to adhere to the broadest reaches of nutritional qualifications, and to this day holds certifications for NSF Gluten-Free, Vegan Action, ISO quality assurance, NSF GMP, and is Kosher, Dairy Free, Soy Free, Herbicide and Pesticide Free, Farm Fresh, Vegetarian, and Non-GMO verified by the Non-GMO Project.
MegaFood is associated with the Non-GMO Dietary Supplement Working Group, the Council for Responsible Nutrition, the Organic Trade Association, Natural Products Association, United Natural Products Alliance, the American Herbal Products Association, and the Weil Foundation.
While MegaFood is not certified organic, it maintains its relations to small and local farms by guaranteeing that their harvests are herbicide and pesticide free, and non-GMO, while not securing the organic qualifications that could hurt smaller businesses.
Are Vitamins Important?
The human body is intended to ingest and absorb a varied diet of nutrient rich plants and vegetables, and meat from all types of animals.
As we evolved as hunter gatherers, our body evolved to our adaptive diet, however, as human civilization has progressed so quickly in the past few thousand years, our biological processes and make up have not had the time to catch up. Firstly our early agricultural practices divorced us from our ancient scavenging, shifting our staples from whatever we could find (diverse and broadly nutritional) to plentiful but unvarying crops and animals. Now as we have entered the fast food era, our biological systems have been co-opted to seek out food with high calories but low vitamin content.
Vitamin deficiencies are broad ranging in areas of the world without plentiful food, but ironically, are now just as common in nations that struggle with obesity and over-abundance of calories.
As the human body requires a vast and broad-ranging array of minerals, vitamins, and nutrients, lacking in any area can have devastating consequences on an individual's health. A common story is the abundance of scurvy in the college student population; this condition is brought on by a lack of vitamin C, and is common in those students who are living away from home for the first time, and eating an unhealthy diet away from the eye of their guardians.
The world has only benefited from our understanding of human physiology and dietary needs. Where 50 years ago, the perfect picture of health was a hearty English breakfast or a roast dinner, our perception of what the human body has drastically changed, as so has our eye for nutritional requirements.
Now a healthy diet is not restricted to just enough food to feel full, but rather to cover the intake of a plethora of vitamins, minerals, and even metals into the body.
What Sets MegaFood Apart?
In the current market, there are too many manufacturers, brands, and off-shoots of supplements, vitamins, and dietary aids to count, and a separate industry has popped up just to track and verify claims of these companies. Most vitamins available are synthetic compounds, created in a lab with raw materials.
These are poorly digested, not allowing the vitamins to be absorbed, in addition, these can be much harder on the kidneys which are tasked with filtering all these synthetic chemicals.
MegaFoods has instead lead the market in whole food vitamins. Rather than extract and synthesize chemical equivalents of the nutrients we are missing in our food, MegaFood has instead taken the foods we lack, and concentrated them into tablets. Think of it like taking spinach pills instead of eating a plate of spinach.
The aim is to replicate what we would naturally need to eat, not the chemicals in the food we would naturally need to eat.
MegaFood prides itself on transparency, and is happy to tightly control its entire process from the close working relationship it maintains with its small and local farms and producers, all the way to the tablet that heads to your local vitamin shop. Their process is strictly regulated in house, and ensured by a number of associations and qualifications that hold MegaFood accountable.
The current market is saturated with miracle pills, wonder dietary aids, and panaceas with no regard for the natural world. Our desire for nutritionally complete intake of food and supplements has changed once again to focus not only on a complete vitamin profile, but on whole food vitamins as the best option.
As one of the longest standing manufacturers of whole food vitamins in the USA, MegaFood has and will continue to set the standard for the most bio-available, healthy, and quality assured supplements that any customer could hope for.
