Color, clarity and haze

Two visual properties that customers read as quality, and both change on the shelf.

Clarity is a decision

Bright and clear reads as controlled and commercial. Cloudy reads as natural and unfiltered.

Both are legitimate and they have to be chosen, because a product that is sometimes one and sometimes the other reads as inconsistent rather than as either.

If you choose cloudy, say so on the label, "naturally cloudy, shake before opening" turns a complaint into an instruction.

Where haze comes from

Tea polyphenols and protein combining as the drink cools, which is the classic tea haze and is reversible on warming.

Pectin and pulp from juice.

Live culture, in a fermented product, which will also settle.

Precipitation of something that was soluble hot and is not cold, which is why a product clear at filling can be hazy in a fridge.

The fix depends on the cause: filtration, a different extraction temperature, or accepting it and saying so.

Color fades

Natural colors in beverages are among the least stable things in this estate.

Anthocyanins, the reds and purples in berries, hibiscus and red cabbage, are pH sensitive and shift hue with acidity, and they fade in light and heat.

So a pink drink can turn brown over a shelf life, and the customer reads it as spoiled.

Amber glass, a shorter stated shelf life, and a color-stable formulation are the three answers, and the first is the cheapest.

Choosing a position

Judge color and clarity at the end of shelf life, under the lighting of a real shop, from a bottle stored as customers store it.

Keep a reference bottle from an approved batch and compare.

And decide what you will tell a customer about it before they ask, because both of these generate questions and a confident answer is worth more than a perfect product.

References