Why Litt and Gillman removed two teaspoons of sugar from kids vitamins

Two teaspoons of sugar in a daily gummy started an argument about dose. For Half Life that argument is familiar. A child who takes a vitamin every morning gets that sugar every morning too, which makes the excipient part of the exposure. Darren Litt and Adam Gillman, two fathers in Los Angeles, built Hiya around full body nourishment for children with zero added sugar and no gummy base.

The origin point is a kitchen counter in Los Angeles, not a laboratory bench. Litt and Gillman had worked together, had small children at home, and had done what careful parents do by following a pediatrician recommendation. The bottle they ordered from Amazon arrived stuck together, with loose sugar sitting at the bottom and a chew that behaved like confectionery.

That bottle raised a plain pharmacology question. What is the daily load besides the vitamins. The founders describe three years of work with pediatricians, nutritionists, scientists and parents before launch. Hiya debuted on March 2, 2020 as a direct to consumer chewable with 15 essential vitamins and minerals plus a blend of 12 fruits and vegetables, sweetened with monk fruit. The company now reports more than one million subscription parents and a range that includes probiotic, greens, iron and more. The interest here is subtraction. No added sugar. No gummy additives. No synthetic dyes. No fillers. The label is shorter, so each remaining milligram has to justify itself.

Your label claims zero added sugar and your site lists monk fruit as the sweetener, so I am reading dose and source together. What paper proves that claim, and what remains unclear in sweetener or flavor supply chains?

Paper proves it before marketing does. The Supplement Facts panel separates total sugars from added sugars on distinct lines. The other ingredients line has to name the sweetener and the flavor system. If monk fruit extract provides the sweetness, the label lists that name. Had added sugar been used, it would show in both locations.

Flavor remains the thin spot across the industry. The term natural flavor can describe a blended system sourced from several suppliers. A shopper reads two words. The manufacturer keeps the full breakdown as confidential. That stage stays partly closed and we monitor it. What we leave out can be listed. No added sugar. No gummy additives. No artificial dyes. No fillers. For what can be tracked, we cite the panel and the lot test. For what cannot yet be fully opened, we cite flavor houses where complete disclosure would need supplier consent. Closure would be straightforward. List flavor parts by lot under the same certificate that covers potency and contaminants.

You report three years of formulating with pediatricians, nutritionists, scientists and parents before the March 2, 2020 launch. Who grew or supplied those first real food ingredients, and what passed or failed in those early lots

We began with what would never enter the tablet. No sugar, no gummy junk, only what children truly require. That reads as simple. During sourcing it is not. A gummy depends on glucose syrup, gelatin or pectin, color and coating for structure. Take those away and chew, flavor and stability must be rebuilt from other matter.

Pediatricians set the levels, nutritionists advised on the forms, scientists tested stability, and parents judged whether a child would actually chew the result. The target was 15 essential vitamins and minerals plus 12 fruits and vegetables, sweetened with monk fruit. Batches that required added sugar for palatability were rejected. Batches that relied on synthetic dyes for appearance were rejected. Fillers that added mass without purpose were rejected. We retained batches where identity was confirmed on the certificate and taste came from real food and monk fruit. We view our product not only as the vitamin placed in the mouth, but an experience children enjoy. Children do not wake up eager for vitamins as such. The chew had to earn space on the counter.

You ordered a pediatrician recommended gummy on Amazon and it arrived stuck together with sugar settled on the bottom, and you later likened the category to a piece of chocolate cake. What did that bottle reveal about where kids vitamins begin

That bottle showed us we had started in the wrong category. We were two dads attempting to act responsibly. We consulted the pediatrician, we bought the suggested product, and the package that arrived resembled candy that had melted and reset. It felt tacky. It shed sugar onto paper. Our children enjoyed the flavor for the wrong reason.

In plain terms, we brought a Silicon Valley habit to childrens health. We examined the Supplement Facts panel line by line. We examined the other ingredients line. We found the typical childrens supplement delivers two teaspoons of sugar to children every single day. Sugar addiction is widespread, and still it sat inside a product intended for daily intake. Our mandate is to offer a childrens vitamin that performs its labeled role, without needless sugar and gummy junk. If children consumed steamed kale daily, a multivitamin might be unnecessary. Most do not. So a daily format counted, yet the raw materials had to be different.

Hiya says its products are third party tested and made in the USA. For the multivitamin lot in a parents hand, what is truly tested, by whom, and what does the certificate of analysis record

We expanded very quickly, perhaps as quickly as any direct to consumer company operating today, yet we would not trade away safety, quality and testing. That principle shaped each decision to scale. Third party tested means a laboratory independent of the maker and the brand measures the product against a specification.

For a chewable multivitamin, a certificate of analysis generally records input identity, strength of central vitamins and minerals relative to label claim, and contaminant limits covering heavy metals and microbes. Heavy metals denotes lead, cadmium, arsenic and mercury quantified in parts per million or parts per billion against a limit. Microbial analysis screens for indicator organisms and pathogens. The certificate attaches to one lot and batch. Batch describes what was produced together. Lot describes how it is traced. Parents can consult the Supplement Facts panel for amounts and the other ingredients line for excipients. The seal or wording on the label should identify the tester or program. We retain that documentation because trust lacking a document is only assertion.

Your promise cites 15 essential vitamins and minerals plus 12 fruits and vegetables in one chewable sweetened with monk fruit. How does that powder become a tablet without gummy additives, and where do extraction or drying enter the chain?

Produce enters one end and a pressed chewable leaves the other. Between those points come drying, milling, blending and pressing. Fruits and vegetables are dried to drive off water, then ground to powder so a small fill weight can contain them. Vitamins and minerals enter as distinct inputs with separate lots. All components meet in a blender, then move to a press that shapes the chewable.

Extract ratio is relevant here. It states how much starting plant yields one part of extract. Standardised means a single marker compound is kept within a defined range across lots. Those two definitions show why two powders under one name can perform differently. We fix the formula, the supplier supplies lot documentation, and the finished chewable must cohere without the gummy matrix. That required time. Monk fruit supplies sweetness without added sugar, and the flavors present in candy are absent from this tablet. The outcome is a chewable produced in the USA that travels in a refillable glass bottle with monthly refill pouches, which also required the tablet to endure the pouch, postal transit and a kitchen counter.

We began as two dads trying to make a responsible choice.

Darren Litt and Adam Gillman

The Kids Daily Probiotic lists 10 billion live cultures chosen for childhood needs. How do you track a live organism from fermentation tank to chewable, and what does testing find at the end of shelf life

A probiotic begins inside a fermentation tank. That means a sanitary vessel where one bacterial strain is fed and multiplied under managed temperature and pH. The culture is collected, concentrated, dried or stabilized, then mixed toward a target count expressed in colony forming units. Colony forming units, abbreviated CFU, estimate living cells capable of growth under assay conditions.

After that the record concerns survival. Heat, moisture and time lower the viable count. So the lot file records strain identity, input CFU per gram, blend mass, and finished CFU at release. A rigorous label also reflects CFU at end of shelf life, not solely on the production date. Assays at release and at stability intervals indicate whether the count persisted. Directions for storage on the label form part of that evidence. For parents studying the panel, strain names and the CFU figure belong side by side. Either element alone leaves provenance incomplete. The chewable presentation adds another control, because compression force and moisture must remain within bounds that hold the count at the labeled value.

The Kids Daily Greens plus Superfoods lists 55 whole food sourced ingredients with zero sugar and a chocolate taste for kids. With that many inputs, how do you keep farm origin and lot identity intact

Fifty five inputs equal fifty five lots. Every whole food component arrives with a separate origin, harvest date and lot number. Greens, fruits, vegetables and other botanical powders are dried and ground before reaching the blender. The blending record is where traceability either survives or fails.

We preserve it by segregating each input lot until blending, then tying each input lot to a single finished batch number. The sealed canister carries that batch number for traceability. The certificate for the batch reports assay outcomes for the mixture. Chocolate character without sugar derives from cocoa plus monk fruit and flavor, each declared in the other ingredients line. Directions for use stay deliberately plain. Mix the powder into milk or a milk alternative. Behind that instruction sits a blend sheet logging how many grams from each lot entered the vessel. When a parent asks where exactly does this come from, the truthful reply for a 55 part mixture is a list, not one farm. We retain the list by batch.

In 2024 USANA bought a controlling stake implying a 260 million dollar valuation, with forecasts of more than 100 million dollars in net sales and over one million subscription parents. How does that scale alter testing, sampling and what you can still name by grower

Scale alters sampling before anything else. Additional lots each month require additional certificates, additional retain samples and additional stability pulls. Retain samples are sealed units held from every batch so the maker can test again if an issue appears later. At present volume, each batch is assayed against specification prior to release. That rigor made growth possible.

Your instincts help you notice what others missed and solve problems, and the data keeps you honest. But view either claim with measured skepticism. That guides our sourcing. Instinct suggested parents would accept a premium for trust instead of pursuing the lowest price. Data disciplines that view through pass rates, complaint rates and stability outcomes. I chose to earn less rather than remain limited by what I could accomplish while employed by someone else. Autonomy still informs choices, even within a broader organization. What we can identify by grower stays strongest where the chain is brief. Where the chain passes through brokers or flavor houses, we mark the stage as not yet fully traceable and describe what record would fill the gap.

Hiya launched direct to consumer with a refillable glass bottle and monthly pouches, since you reject plastic bottles. What does that packaging choice alter in encapsulation, fill weight and stability

Glass alters exposure to moisture and light. A refillable glass bottle with a secure closure shields chewables from kitchen humidity more effectively than a thin pouch kept open. Monthly refill pouches consume less material per serving than a fresh bottle every month, but the pouch film still has to resist moisture during mail shipment.

Fill weight denotes the mass inside each chewable or scoop. Encapsulation in this context denotes shaping and guarding that mass, whether as a compressed tablet or a powder inside a pouch. Stability work monitors strength, moisture, texture and flavor over time inside the real package. A tablet stable in glass may soften in a pouch when the film permits vapor. A powder that flows cleanly on day one may cake after moisture ingress. So packaging functions as part of the formula. We selected glass for the counter and pouches for refills because parents keep the bottle and obtain a fresh lot monthly. The lot printed on the pouch should align with the certificate for that month.

Closing note from the desk

What remains after this exchange is a refusal list maintained through rapid expansion. No added sugar. No gummy additives. No synthetic dyes. No fillers. No plastic bottles left on the daily counter. The founders address parents as fellow parents, and the memorable detail is operational rather than promotional. Lot numbers, blend sheets, retain samples, plus stability pulls.

Hiya aimed to recast the daily childrens vitamin as full body nourishment a child will willingly chew. The brand reports what the label contains and leaves further assertions off the page. Certain stages, notably flavor composition and multi farm blends, stay partly closed. The desk acknowledges what can be traced and records what documentation would still assist.

Product spotlight

Kids Daily Multivitamin, 30 dollars for a one month supply for one child, used as one daily chewable. It contains 15 essential vitamins and minerals plus a blend of 12 fruits and vegetables, sweetened with monk fruit and zero added sugar. Take as part of the monthly subscription with refillable glass bottle and refill pouches.

Kids Daily Probiotic, 30 dollars for a one month supply for one child, used as one daily chewable. It declares 10 billion live cultures from strains chosen for childhood needs, with strain names and amounts on the Supplement Facts panel. Take daily for routine gut support as described on the label, kept as directed to maintain live count.