Verdure Sciences celebrated its 20-year Anniversary and unveiled details of on a new corporate campus during the Supply Side West show in Las Vegas, NV in true style with champagne and cake at the booth. As an independent and privately-owned company, twenty years is quite a milestone. Verdure Sciences has evolved over the years along with the natural products industry. Founder and CEO, Ajay Patel, began the business as GENI Inc. in Indianapolis, Indiana shortly after graduating from Purdue University with a chemical engineering degree. In 1997, Patel saw an opportunity to sell Garcinia, with his familiarity knowing that the botanical was native to his homeland, India. Patel’s reflections upon initial sales coincides with frustrating accounts of botanical extract color as a prime quality indicator, many times superseding chemical analysis. These early frustrations helped outline Patel’s vision to deliver high quality botanical extracts based on chemical identity and traceable initiatives, balanced with innovation and conservative management principles. Although GMP’s were under DSHEA, specific guidelines were not finalized for over a decade. Patel, stayed true to his vision and worked with industry associations to ensure quality standards and efficacy became leading requirements.
In early 2002, the next chapter of branding and clinical initiatives began, the first of which was on the efficacy and tolerability of Boswellia serrata, branded as WokVelÒ(Phytomedicine. 2003. 10: 3-7). Feedback and acknowledgement regarding the integrity and appreciation of the investment into human clinicals, encouraged Patel to proceed with further investments and to rename the company in 2005 to Verdure Sciences Inc. At this same time Verdure began to license and develop intellectual property, resulting in PomellaÒ Pomegranate Extract.
Over the next decade, Verdure launched numerous branded ingredients, including well-known ingredients such as LongvidaÒ Optimized Curcumin, BacognizeÒ, TinofendÒ, and CalzboneÒ along with VBATSÔ, Verdure’s Botanical Active Testing System.
Next year, Verdure will be in a new 7-acre corporate campus including office, laboratory, product development, greenhouse, and warehouse spaces. The campus will encourage healthy living with a wellness building and outdoor walking trail surrounded by native fauna and flora.
“Verdure’s continuous investments in both clinical initiatives and back end integration, provides our customers with both market substantiation and trusted traceability, ultimately benefiting the consumer. Our founding beliefs remain our top priority today and I believe because of that – our company remains viable, strong, growing, and abig thank you to all valued customers and strategic partners, but especially to those who have had faith in Verdure Sciences from the very beginning.” states Patel.
