The Longest Mile: September Edition

I keep a protein bar in my bag. Most weeks it is the difference between eating something and eating nothing.

That is the entire appeal. Twenty grams of protein, no prep, no cooler, no line. When the day gets away from you, a bar keeps you off the gas station counter.

The category has gotten worse while looking better.

Start at the bottom shelf. Clif Builders leads with soy protein isolate, cane syrup, cane sugar, brown rice syrup, palm kernel oil, and sunflower or soybean oil. Quest leads with milk protein isolate and whey protein isolate, then soluble corn fiber, erythritol, palm kernel oil, and sucralose. These are candy bars with the sugar traded for sugar alcohol.

Then there is the engineered tier. David built a $2.25 billion company in two years on one number: 28 grams of protein, 150 calories. AgFunderNews reported the $250 million round behind that valuation this month. The number is possible because of EPG, esterified propoxylated glycerol, a modified plant fat the gut largely cannot break down. On the label it reads as modified plant fat. David's own FAQ recommends a limit of two bars per day and notes that overconsumption may cause GI effects. The 2014 human trial on EPG, run by the Chicago Center for Clinical Research, found loose and oily stools at 25 to 40 grams a day and lower blood levels of vitamin K1 and beta carotene.

Then there is the tier built for people like us.

Lineage Provisions, Prima, Jacob. Grass fed whey. Beef tallow. Raw honey. No seed oils, no gums, no sugar alcohols. I buy these. Lineage runs $49.99 for twelve, about $4.17 a bar, and the others sit in the same range. At five dollars you have high expectations.

Here is the part that does not make the front of the wrapper. Most of these bars reach their protein number with a blend of whey and collagen.

Collagen is not the same protein as whey. It contains no tryptophan at all, which makes it an incomplete protein, and it is very low in leucine, the amino acid that triggers muscle protein synthesis. In a randomized trial published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, older women given whey showed greater acute and longer term muscle protein synthesis than women given the same amount of collagen. A separate randomized trial in recreational athletes found that 30 grams of whey after resistance training raised myofibrillar protein synthesis and 30 grams of collagen did not.

Collagen does real work for skin, hair, nails, and connective tissue. It does not build muscle.

The FDA already accounts for this. Percent daily value for protein is corrected for protein quality using protein digestibility corrected amino acid score (PDCAAS). It rates a protein from 0 to 1.0 on two things: whether it supplies every essential amino acid the body cannot make on its own, and how much of it you actually digest. Whey and egg white score 1.0. Collagen scores zero, because a protein missing even one essential amino acid drops to the floor, and collagen is missing tryptophan. The grams printed on the front of the wrapper are not corrected. A bar can advertise 20 grams of protein while part of that number does nothing for the reason you bought it.

Almost none of these brands disclose the split.

The ingredient list is the tell, because ingredients are listed by weight. Lineage lists its protein blend as grass fed whey protein concentrate first, then bovine collagen, and had the finished bar third party tested at a PDCAAS of 0.86. Prima lists the blend the other way, collagen first and whey second, and still markets 21 grams of complete animal protein. Jacob uses whey isolate, milk protein isolate, and collagen. Same shelf, same price, very different math.

Worth saying plainly: David publishes a PDCAAS of 1.0 for its bar. Whatever you think of EPG, the protein claim is disclosed and verifiable. The clean brands charging twice as much mostly leave you guessing. That one stings.

So the routine is simple. Read the order of the protein blend, not the number on the front. Check the percent daily value for protein on the back panel. Buy collagen on its own if you want it, unflavored, by the tub, stirred into coffee where it costs a fraction of what a bar charges for it. Treat the bar as a backup and not a meal. Two eggs, leftover steak, or plain yogurt beats all of it when you have ten minutes.

This is the same pattern that pulled me into apparel in the first place. A shirt says performance across the chest. The fiber content panel on the inside seam says 88 percent polyester. Both statements are true. Only one tells you what you are actually wearing.

We built Mellow Mile around the second one. Organic cotton, bamboo viscose, OEKO-TEX certified, materials named where you can find them. Not because it makes a better headline, but because the composition is the product.

A number on the front of a package is a marketing decision. What sits behind that number is a formulation decision. Learn to read the second one and most of the category sorts itself out.

Quick update on the business. We are restocking all sizes of the organic cotton - wrapped boxers. They are in production and will be put on the cargo ship, which takes about a month to get to us. Should be restocked by end of October.

Thomas
Co-founder