Originally published February 13 2012
Equity company that helped buy NutraSweet from Monsanto also funds Sunny Delight, Fitness Quest and Mattress Firm
by Jonathan Benson, staff writer
(NaturalNews) Prior to the year 2000, the Monsanto Co. owned the NutraSweet Co., which is responsible for the inventions of both aspartame and neotame, two artificial sweeteners that are highly pervasive in the conventional food supply. But today, NutraSweet is actually now owned by J.W. Childs Equity Partners II LP, a private equity firm based in Boston, Mass., that also owns the Sunny Delight Beverages Co., Fitness Quest, Brookstone, Mattress Firm, and a number of other companies you probably would not suspect.
You see, many of the corporations responsible for purveying evil in our world today are conglomerates, which means they are owned by, or directly partnered with, other corporations that may or may not market or sell the same types of products as each other, but that together dominate large segments of the consumer marketplace. This is also true of chemical and processed food companies as well, many of which are owned by larger parent companies that also own drug companies, for instance.
When we recently reported about the hidden presence of neotame, a chemical sweetener produced by NutraSweet, in the conventional food supply, many people in the natural health community took notice. After all, Monsanto, NutraSweet's original owner, successfully lobbied the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to approve neotame's use in food without even having to be labeled, a process that began in 1997 while Monsanto still owned the company. This means that consumers today do not even have a choice in whether or not to consume the chemical (http://www.naturalnews.com/034915_neotame_Mo...).
But Monsanto no longer owns NutraSweet or its neotame chemical, as the J.W. Childs firm purchased the company back in 2000. So J.W. Childs is now responsible for lacing much of the food supply around the world with a chemical that, like aspartame, is linked to neurotoxic and immunotoxic damage. And yet at the same time, J.W. Childs also owns a number of other companies like Advantage Sales and Marketing (ASM), which provides sales, merchandising, category management and marketing services to manufacturers, suppliers and producers of food products and consumer packaged goods.
Some of ASM's clients include big names like Unilever, Kroger, Axe, Smucker's, Schering-Plough, Lipton, Hanes, Newman's Own, Bumble Bee, Arm & Hammer, Gatorade, Tropicana, Del Monte, Energizer, Dial, Rubbermaid, and Dove. Also included in the company's client list are a few natural and organic brands, including Seventh Generation and Method.
Other J.W. Childs companies include Brookstone, CGH Healthcare Services, Fitness Quest, Mattress Firm, and Sunny Delight Beverage Co. (http://www.jwchilds.com/portfolio.html).
Sources for this article include:
http://www.jwchilds.com/portfolio.html
http://chronicle.augusta.com/stories/2000/05...
http://www.asmnet.com/Newsroom/pressreleases...
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