CLEAN INGREDIENTS — SIMPLE BARS

By Kathy Fox

Eating healthy and clean are ways to improve one’s overall health. By consuming minimally processed foods along with fresh vegetables and fruits, our bodies can receive the maximum nutritional benefits from the foods we eat. In addition, by reducing the intake of sugars several health risks, including obesity, type 2 diabetes, and coronary heart disease, can be lowered. The problem is sugar is delicious and cutting sugar from the diet can be quite difficult since it is added to many everyday foods we eat, such as bread, salad dressing, ketchup, cereal, snack bars, and beverages.

What started as a simple three-week challenge to eliminate sugar from the diet ended up blossoming into a full-fledged business. Amanda Ament, founder and owner of SIMPLE, explains, “I eliminated sugar from my diet completely and it was meant to be a challenge because I was overeating on sweets at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. After two weeks, I noticed I had more energy, was sleeping better, and my skin looked better. So I kept adding weeks to my challenge, then months, then years.”

During this time, Ament would snack on nuts and fruits and was continually on the hunt for snack bars made without sugar.

The search for a sugar-free snack bar is what triggered Ament to start the company, SIMPLE, in 2017 because she couldn't find a bar that didn't have sugar in it. Originally from Switzerland, Ament said, “I started making my own bars in my kitchen back home and would mix up different nuts and superfoods, like chia and matcha. I spent hours mixing different nuts and seeds to make the perfect bar.” Once Ament had perfected her recipe, she wanted to share the snack bars with everyone, and SIMPLE Bars was branded and went into production.

AMANDA AND MELANIE AMENT

Ament, who focuses on production, found a company that could manufacture the bars in the United States and would make frequent trips between Zurich and the United States to oversee production at the Illinois facility and attend trade shows. However, due to COVID, the plant was unable to continue with production, which led Ament to find another facility in the Nashville area. Due to the recurrent trips between the United States and Switzerland, Ament and her sister, Melanie Ament, who handles marketing, public relations, and social media for SIMPLE, decided to move to Franklin, Tennessee, in February 2022.

What makes SIMPLE Bars distinctive is the sweetener ingredient Allulose, which is a naturally occurring sweetener found in fruits like figs. It does not affect blood sugar or insulin levels, is low in calories, and tastes like sugar. Sugarwise is an international authority on sugar-related claims with more than 500 products certified that are shipped in 70 countries around the world and has certified the SIMPLE Bars. Rend Plating, CEO of Sugarwise, says, “Sugarwise certifies products that are low in the kinds of sugars and sweeteners that need to be limited in the diet because they are contributors to obesity, type 2 diabetes, and tooth decay. SIMPLE Bars are a new range of products that have the potential to change the way people see and consume sweet snacks. In completely clean label innovation, it is extremely rare to see something that has a flavor profile that not only matches but surpasses a traditional sugar-coated experience. This SUGARWISE-certified product range does just that. Rather than just replacing sugar in a nutritionally poor product the bars include ingredients that are nutritionally rich and high in fiber. Products like this have the potential to improve the overall quality of our diets. Better bars. Better health. Better world. Simple, isn't it?"

In addition to having no sugar added, SIMPLE Bars are 85.5% less sugar than KIND bars as certified by Sugarwise, they are gluten-free, nonGMO, all-natural, have a low glycemic index, and are keto. For those dealing with Hashimoto’s or diabetes, where a low-sugar diet is vital, the bars are an outstanding choice plus they are loaded with superfoods and are an explosion of flavor.

SIMPLE Bars were recently launched in August 2022 and are the first and only snack bar brand in the United States ‘Certified Free from Added Sugar’ by Sugarwise. SIMPLE Bars come in four exotic tasty flavors; Almond & Dragon Fruit, Almond Match Chia, Chocolate Sea Salt, and Walnut & Golden Spices, and can be purchased on Amazon, Chadwick’s Fitness & Performance Training in Franklin, or from simplebars.com. They are SIMPLE-Y delicious, so enjoy!