Photo Credit: Extra Gum’s Instagram
According to Wikipedia, Extra was launched in 1984 as the Wrigley Company’s first ever sugarfree product, and became one of the most popular brands of chewing gum in the United States within a few years. It was also the first sugarfree gum not to use saccharin, instead using the NutraSweet brand, a sweetener developed by G.D. Searle & Co. that had less bitterness and was believed to be safer in humans and laboratory animals; it was later reformulated with aspartame in 1997. In 2007, Extra became one of the first chewing gums to receive the American Dental Association’s Seal of Acceptance. While it has the ADA’s seal of acceptance, is Extra Gum Vegan?
A full vegan-friendly analysis of each Extra Gum product can be found in the following sections.
Controversial Vegan Ingredients
Before we start our vegan analysis, we would like to make note of the controversial ingredients that are assumed to be vegan in this analysis. Even though we consider them to be vegan, we will still highlight these ingredients if they appear in any posted ingredient lists. These controversial ingredients include:
Sugar
In almost all candy products, one of the first few ingredients is Sugar. Sugar is a controversial product in the vegan community because refined cane sugar is processed with bone char to achieve the pure white color. The sugar itself does not contain any bone char particles, but is not vegan due to the processing methods used. Since the type of sugar is typically not stated, it is assumed to be vegan in this analysis. If you choose to avoid non-vegan sugars than all of the products in this analysis should be avoided. A full rundown on if sugar is vegan can be found in our article titled “Is Your Sugar Vegan? Lets Find Out!“
Natural and Artificial Flavorings
Natural flavors can come from both animal or plant sources, but the natural flavors in candies are typically from plant sources. Those natural flavors from animal-origin will be highlighted if known.
Colors
Some food colors are controversial in the vegan community. This is because food colors are often tested on animals. In this article we assume all food colors are vegan, unless the color itself is from an animal or insect origin (e.g. Carmine).
Extra Gum
Extra Gum Ingredients
Sorbitol, Gum Base, Glycerol, Natural and Artificial Flavors, Less Than 2% Of: Hydrogenated Starch Hydrolysate, Aspartame, Mannitol, Acesulfame K, Soy Lecithin, BHT (To Maintain Freshness), and Colors. [Source]
Is Extra Gum Vegan?
As Peta points out in their article, “Is Gum Vegan?” the most common animal derived ingredients in gum are gelatin, stearic acid, and glycerin. As of August 2019, it appear that these ingredients have been removed from all of the Extra gum flavors. Therefore, all of the flavors of Extra Gum are vegan! This includes the newest line of the Extra Gum Refreshers. All of the following flavors have been verified to be vegan as of the time of this writing.
Extra Chewy Mints
Extra Chewy Mint Ingredients
Sugar, Corn Syrup, Hydrogenated Palm Kernel Oil; Less than 2% of: Natural and Artificial Flavors, Tapioca Dextrin, Modified Corn Starch, Carnauba Wax, and Color [Source]
Are Extra Chewy Mints Vegan?
As the ingredients in Extra’s Chewy Mints are very similar to their gum, the chewy mints are also vegan friendly! This applies to both the Peppermint and Polar Ice flavors at the time of this writing.
Video Version of this Article
Summary
Even though many articles have stated that some of Extra Gum’s flavors had gelatin in them, we did not find that to be true in our analysis. It appears that all of the Extra Gum and Chewy Mint flavors are now vegan friendly!
You can read about other vegan snack options here.
