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Ingredient & advertising guide

This page has two jobs. First, it explains everything printed on the pouch we sell: the three named lines on the panel, the ten other ingredients that turn them into a chew, what each one is, and what the research does and does not say about it, including who was in each study, at what amount, and what each study actually measured. Second, and this is the part most advertising pages leave out, it lists the headlines we run, tells you which ones are exaggerated, and separates the small number of things that are genuinely supported by evidence from the many that are not.

1. Our headlines, and what is actually true

These are the headlines we have run, grouped by the claim they make. The right-hand column is our own plain assessment. We have marked each family of headlines as Exaggerated, Partly true, Withdrawn, Our headline was wrong or Broadly supported.

The headline as you saw it	What is actually behind it
"The Blueberry on This Bag Is the Flavor, Not the Ingredient."	Broadly supported This is the one headline we run that states a fact you can check on the package itself, and it checks out on both sides. The front of the pouch prints "Blueberry Pomegranate Flavor", with the word "Flavor" printed by the maker, and the Supplement Facts panel on the back prints exactly three named lines: beet root powder 300 mg, Verti-te resveratrol (grape-derived) 150 mg and coffee (Coffea arabica) fruit extract 100 mg. Neither blueberry nor pomegranate appears on that panel; both are carried in the flavoring, which the ingredient list gives as "natural flavors" with no weight beside it. The headline says nothing about whether the product works, and we are not implying that it does. It describes what is on the front of the bag against what is counted on the back.
"Mental Decline Begins When Seniors Can't Spell These 3 Words. Test Now""Top Doctors Say Mental Decline Begins When Seniors Can't Pronounce These 3 Phrases. Can You?""Memory Decline Begins When Seniors Say These 3 Phrases (See The List)""Declining Memory Begins When Seniors Say These 7 Phrases. See Which Ones"	Exaggerated There is no set of three words, three phrases or seven phrases whose spelling or pronunciation marks the beginning of anything. Nothing "begins" at a word. Word tasks do appear inside the short memory checks clinicians use, but those checks are given in person and read alongside your history, what you take daily and your age. Failing a word online means nothing on its own: plenty of people stumble over a word when they are tired, nervous or being timed. "Top doctors" refers to no specific person. See section 4.
"Japan's Oldest Doctors Say Memory Loss Isn't Age: Just Avoid Drinking These 3 Beverages""Japan's Greatest Doctors Say Memory Loss Isn't Age: Just Avoid Drinking These 3 Beverages""Japan's Oldest Doctors Say Memory Loss Isn't Age: Just Stop Eating These 3 Foods"	Exaggerated No group of Japanese doctors issued this statement. There is no such panel, no such list, and no source we can point you to. Japan appears in the headline because it is widely associated with long life, which makes the claim feel credible. That is a marketing decision, not a citation. The second half is also wrong. Memory changes with age for everyone, and no diet removes that. What is true is narrower: certain long-term drinking and eating patterns travel with faster slippage on thinking tests in large population studies. [1] [2] Association is not proof of cause, and "just avoid these three" is not how any of it works.
"Nobel Prize's Doctors Say Memory Loss Isn't Age: Just Stop Eating These 3 Foods"	Withdrawn We retract this one outright. No Nobel laureate has endorsed this page, this product, or any list of three foods on our behalf. Attaching the Nobel Prize to an advertisement implies an authority that does not exist and we should not have run it.
"The Overlooked Boxed Cereal Now Tied to 8 Out of 10 Memory Cases"	Our headline was wrong There is no such statistic. No study ties any cereal to eight out of ten cases of anything, "memory cases" is not a category any researcher uses, and no cereal has been "overlooked" by anyone: the sugar figure is printed on the side of every box. The number was invented for the headline and we withdraw it. The grain of truth is the one below: a diet heavy in ultra-processed food, the sweet cereal shelf included, travels in a large Brazilian study with somewhat faster slippage on thinking tests over eight years. [2] That is a modest association across thousands of people, not eight in ten of anyone. See section 3.
"Brain Experts Now Say These 3 Cereals Age the Brain Faster Than Time""Scientists Now Say This 1 Cereal Ages the Brain Faster Than Time"	Exaggerated No food ages the brain "faster than time." That phrase was written for effect and it is not a finding from any study. It is also internally inconsistent: in one version it is three cereals, in another it is one, because the number is something we test for click-through, not something anyone measured. The grain of truth: diets high in ultra-processed food are associated with somewhat faster slippage on thinking tests over years. [2] See section 3.
"Doctors Now Say This Popular Evening Drink Is Behind Memory Loss"	Partly true The "evening drink" is alcohol, and of everything our ads point at, this is where the evidence is strongest. In British civil servants followed for thirty years, higher drinking went with shrinkage of the hippocampus, the region most involved in forming memories, and with faster decline in word fluency; light drinkers had no edge over non-drinkers. [1] What is overstated is the word "behind." Alcohol is one contributing factor among many, not the cause of memory slips. It is also worth saying plainly: the chew we sell contains no alcohol, and the front of its pouch prints the word "Decaffeinated".
"Doctors Name 5 Popular Drinks Now Tied To Memory Decline. Coffee Tops The List""Seniors: These 4 Drinks May Be Aging Your Brain Faster""Neurologists Say Cognitive Decline Isn't Age: Just Stop Drinking These 2 Popular Drinks"	Exaggerated Notice that the count changes: two drinks, three, four, five. It changes because it is an advertising variable we rotate, not a number that came out of a study. No neurologist is named in any version, because none was consulted. "Coffee tops the list" is the clearest thing we have got wrong: none of the studies on this page is about plain coffee. The Food and Drug Administration cites 400 milligrams of caffeine a day, two to three 12-ounce cups of brewed coffee, as an amount not generally associated with negative effects in most healthy adults. [3] There is a second reason this matters here. One of the three named lines in the product we sell is an extract of the fruit that grows around the coffee bean, and the maker prints "Decaffeinated" on the front of the pouch. See section 2 and section 6.
"Memory Slipping? Check These 4 Everyday Drinks First"	Partly true Half right, in the wrong order. If your memory is slipping, the first thing to check is not a drink; it is a conversation with your own clinician about your nights, your hearing and what you take daily. The four drinks are the everyday ones in section 2. Not enough plain water belongs on the list too, and of everything in our advertising that is the item with the least glamour and the most support. [4] [5]
"Still Sharp at 90? Seniors Are Rethinking These 3 Everyday Foods"	Partly true The gentlest of our headlines, and still an overstatement. Nobody knows what keeps a particular person sharp at 90, and no single food does it. The three everyday foods are sugary breakfast cereals, processed meats and packaged baked goods, all in section 3. Eating less of them is part of the long, slow habits in section 5, and no food is a promise at any age.
"One chew a day, three ingredients, and the only one with a memory study behind it"	Partly true The chew and the three ingredients are accurate: the label says one chew daily and the panel prints three named lines. The last clause is true and needs its detail. Of the three, only the grape-derived resveratrol has a study that put a word list in front of people: 200 milligrams a day for 26 weeks in 46 healthy overweight adults aged 50 to 75, who held on to more words after a 30-minute delay and showed higher hippocampal connectivity on a scan. [6] The panel prints 150 milligrams, three quarters of that amount, and every participant in that study was overweight. The beet line rests on a single day of nitrate-rich eating with juice in older adults averaging about 75, which moved regional blood flow on a scan and measured no memory at all, [7] and the coffee fruit line rests on a single dose in ten people per group that raised a blood protein over two hours. [8] See section 6.
"Neurologists Name 5 Popular Prescriptions Now Tied to Memory Decline"	Partly true, and the one not to act on alone No neurologist named a list for us, and we will not print one. What is true is that pharmacists keep lists of everyday products, some sold over the counter, that are often a poor fit after 65, and that a yearly look at everything you take is worth having. But an advertisement is the worst possible reason to change anything a clinician gave you: never stop or change it because of something you read in an ad, including ours. Put everything you take in one bag, this pouch included, and ask your pharmacist. See the box at the end of section 2.

2. Every drink our ads point at

Our headlines have referred, in different versions, to "3 beverages", "4 drinks", "5 popular drinks", "2 popular drinks" and "this popular evening drink" without ever naming them. Here is the complete list of what we were pointing at, and what the research actually supports for each one. Where a study is cited, it is observational unless stated otherwise: it can show that two things travel together in a population, not that one causes the other.

3. Every food our ads point at

The food headlines referred to "3 foods" and to "cereals": one cereal in some versions, three in others. Again, the number was ours, not a finding. Here is what was meant, and what stands behind it.

4. The "3 words" and "7 phrases" tests

Several of our headlines invite you to test yourself on words or phrases: spell these three words, pronounce these three phrases, see whether you say these seven phrases. There is no such validated test, and we cannot give you a real one, because a real one does not work that way.

What an actual memory check looks like. Clinicians use short structured checks. They do include word tasks: recalling three unrelated words after a delay, naming animals, repeating a sentence. But three things make them different from an online quiz:

• They are given in person, in a standard way, by someone trained to do it.
• The score is read against your age and education, not against a fixed pass mark.
• A low score is a reason for a longer conversation with your clinician, never a verdict by itself.

These checks also produce false alarms. A bad night, trouble hearing, and simply being nervous all lower scores in people whose memory is fine. This is precisely why an online word quiz is meaningless: it has none of the context that makes the real check useful.

5. Everyday habits worth more than any pouch

If we only had one section to be useful in, this would be it. None of these is a supplement, a chew, or a list of three foods, and none of them can be sold to you by us.

• Drink enough plain water, through the day rather than all at once. ^{[4] [5]}
• Sleep enough, at regular hours, and keep caffeine to the morning.
• Get your hearing and your eyesight checked, and use hearing aids or glasses if you need them: straining to hear or see looks a great deal like not remembering.
• Walk, most days. Regular walking counts.
• Drink less alcohol. ^[1]
• Eat more like the MIND pattern and less from the ultra-processed shelf. ^{[12] [2]}
• Stay in touch with people. Conversation is exercise for memory.
• Keep learning something: a language, an instrument, a route you have never driven.
• Once a year, take everything you take to the pharmacist.
• Ask your clinician for a B12 level if nobody has checked it in a few years; the stomach absorbs less of it with age. ^[13]

These are unglamorous. They cannot be delivered in a headline, they take years, and they are, by a wide margin, the most useful things on this entire page.

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6. Ingredient guide: what is actually in the chew we sell

What each ingredient printed on the panel of HumanN (SuperBeets), sold by GNC Memory + Focus is, what it is traditionally used for, and what the cited research says, including who was in each study, at what amount, and what each study actually measured. One chew is a serving, and a pouch holds thirty. Four notes on the panel itself. The three named lines add up to 550 milligrams, and everything else in the chew, by weight, is the tapioca syrup, raw cane sugar, rice bran, flavorings, sunflower lecithin, sunflower oil, malic acid, glycerin, citric acid and stevia extract listed as other ingredients. Blueberry and pomegranate are the flavor and appear nowhere on the panel. The front of the pouch prints "Decaffeinated" for the coffee fruit extract, and the panel gives no caffeine figure. And no study has tested these three ingredients together in anyone.

Beet root (Beta vulgaris) powder

The dried, ground root of the garden beet: the same deep-red vegetable that stains a cutting board, sold as a powder because it is rich in dietary nitrate, which the body turns into nitrite and nitric oxide, a natural widener of blood vessels.

Traditional and everyday use. Eaten as a vegetable across Europe and the Middle East for centuries; beet juice became a sports drink in the 2010s for its nitrate.

What the research says. In a small crossover study of older adults, a single day of a high-nitrate diet that included beet juice was associated with higher regional blood flow in the frontal white matter on MRI, with no change in overall brain blood flow.^[7] That was a day of nitrate-rich food and juice, not 300 mg of powder, and it measured blood flow, not memory.

Amount per serving in SuperBeets Memory + Focus · Blueberry Pomegranate · 30 chews. 300 mg (a day of nitrate-rich food and beet juice moved regional blood flow in a small study; 300 mg of powder is a fraction of a glass of juice)

Good to know. Can color urine and stool pink or red, harmlessly. Beet powder is sold for its dietary nitrate, which the body turns into a widener of blood vessels: talk to your doctor before taking nitrate-rich products daily if you take anything daily.

Resveratrol (Verti-te™)

A polyphenol made by grapes, berries and peanuts, concentrated in grape skins and in red wine, and sold as a supplement usually made from Japanese knotweed root or grape. Verti-te is a branded grape-derived form.

Traditional and everyday use. No use on its own; it arrived with the "French paradox" of the 1990s.

What the research says. In a 26-week placebo-controlled study of 46 healthy overweight adults aged 50 to 75, 200 mg a day of resveratrol was associated with better retention of words over 30 minutes and higher connectivity of the hippocampus on MRI.^[6] One study, in overweight people, with one memory result; the chew holds 150 mg.

Amount per serving in SuperBeets Memory + Focus · Blueberry Pomegranate · 30 chews. 150 mg (three quarters of the 200 mg a day of the 26-week study in overweight adults aged 50 to 75)

Good to know. Generally well tolerated at these doses; higher doses can upset the stomach, and resveratrol can affect how some blood-thinning medicines work: ask a pharmacist if you take any.

Coffee berry (Coffea arabica whole fruit powder)

The red fruit that surrounds the coffee bean, usually discarded after the beans are removed; dried and powdered it contains polyphenols and a small, variable amount of caffeine.

Traditional and everyday use. The fruit is drunk as 'cascara' tea in Yemen and Bolivia.

What the research says. In a single-dose study in healthy adults (10 per group), 100 mg of whole coffee fruit concentrate raised a blood marker (BDNF) by about 143 % over two hours; the authors asked for larger studies, and a blood marker is not a memory test.^[8] Whatever alertness the powder gives comes from its caffeine, which EFSA says increases alertness in moderate doses.^[9]

Amount per serving in SuperBeets Memory + Focus · Blueberry Pomegranate · 30 chews. 100 mg (the single dose that raised a blood marker over two hours in ten people)

Good to know. Contains caffeine in an amount the label does not state; one verified reviewer reports jitters. Count it with your coffee.

*These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. This information does not constitute medical advice and it should not be relied upon as such. This product is not a substitute for medication or other treatment prescribed by a physician or health care provider. Consult your doctor before starting any dietary supplement.

7. What we can and cannot promise

Set against the headlines that brought you here, this is the complete and honest position.

Things we cannot promise, and that nobody selling you a supplement can:

• That this chew will improve your memory, your attention or your concentration.
• That it will stop memory from changing with age.
• That it offsets alcohol, sugar, processed food, or any drink or food named on this page.
• That it can replace anything a clinician gave you, or make a yearly look at everything you take unnecessary.
• That any doctor in Japan, any Nobel laureate, any neurologist or any "brain expert" recommends it. None has.
• That a word or phrase quiz can tell you anything about your brain.
• That the blueberry pictured on the front of the bag is an ingredient. It is the flavor, and the package prints the word "Flavor" itself.
• That the resveratrol in this chew reaches the amount used in its study. That study used 200 milligrams a day for 26 weeks in 46 healthy overweight adults aged 50 to 75; ^[6] the panel prints 150 milligrams, and every participant in it was overweight.
• That the beet powder does what a glass of beet juice does. The study behind that line was a single day of nitrate-rich eating that included juice, in older adults averaging about 75; it left overall brain blood flow unchanged, raised blood flow in one frontal region on a scan, and measured nobody's memory. ^[7]
• That the coffee fruit extract does anything you would notice. Its study was a single dose of 100 milligrams in ten people per group, which raised a blood protein by about 143 % over two hours against about 31 % for two comparison substances, with the authors asking for larger studies. ^[8] The amount on the panel matches the study exactly, and what the study measured was blood.
• That two better-looking grape trials belong to this product. A standardized whole-grape extract at 250 milligrams a day came out ahead of placebo in 111 healthy older adults over 12 weeks ^[14] and in 96 healthy older adults over 84 days, ^[15] both with authors connected to the extract's maker. That extract is a different preparation and it is not what is in this chew.
• That the three ingredients together have ever been tested. They have not, in this chew or in any other form.

Things we can say honestly:

• It is a resealable pouch of thirty soft chews made for HumanN (Human Power of N), whose address is 1250 S. Capital of Texas Hwy., Building 1, Suite 360, Austin, TX 78746, and sold by GNC Holdings, LLC, which publishes a service address at 75 Hopper Place, Suite 501, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, a telephone number, 1-877-462-4700, and an email address, customer-service@gnc-hq.com.
• Every named ingredient carries a printed weight on the panel: beet root powder 300 mg, grape-derived resveratrol 150 mg, coffee fruit extract 100 mg. Nothing is buried inside an undisclosed blend, which is more than many panels in this category can say.
• The other ingredients are tapioca syrup, raw cane sugar, rice bran, natural flavors, sunflower lecithin, sunflower oil, malic acid, glycerin, citric acid and rebiana (stevia extract).
• A chew carries 20 calories, four grams of carbohydrate and two grams of added sugar. The seller's highlights state that it has no gluten, no lactose and no dairy, is suitable for vegans and vegetarians, and is not genetically modified.
• The label's direction is one chew daily, and it states that the product is intended for adult consumption only.
• The seller's list price was $39.99 for the pouch of thirty when we last read it, which is $1.33 a chew. Standard shipping was $12.99 and arrived in two to five business days, with shipping at no charge on orders reaching $59, and in-store pickup available. A promotional discount appeared in the cart on the day we read it; a promotion on one day is not a fact about a product, and we do not quote one.
• The seller's written terms promise a full refund of the purchase price, minus shipping or other charges, on an item returned within 30 days from the order date, in good condition and in its original box where possible, and expressly accept the item used or unused. The clock starts at the order date, not at delivery.
• The seller's page carried 355 ratings averaging 4.0 stars when we read them: 53 % at five, 14 % at four, 21 % at three, 5 % at two and 8 % at one. The seller's own review system notes that these reviews were originally posted on the maker's site and fed through to the seller's page, so they carry no confirmed-purchase mark from the seller and we do not give them one. Five are quoted word for word elsewhere on this site, including one at four stars, and the small pictures beside those quotes are illustrations, not the reviewers. Individual experiences are not evidence.
• GNC files this product under beets and superfoods on its own site, and prints no promise about it beyond the product's own name.
• We earn a commission if you buy. That is our interest in this, stated plainly.
• Nothing here is medical advice, and none of it replaces your own clinician.

8. Questions people ask us

Did a Japanese doctor, a Nobel laureate or a neurologist really say this?

No. Those attributions are advertising language. No named or identifiable expert made those statements, and none has endorsed this product.

Is there blueberry in the chew or not?

There is blueberry flavoring. Blueberry is not one of the three named lines on the panel, and the front of the bag prints the word "Flavor" beside it.

So is coffee bad for my memory or not?

None of the studies on this page is about plain coffee, and our "Coffee Tops The List" headline overstated it. What is worth watching is added sugar in coffee drinks, and caffeine late enough in the day to cost you a night. ^{[3] [9]}

Does the chew contain caffeine?

The front of the pouch prints "Decaffeinated" for the coffee fruit extract. That is the maker's statement; the panel gives no milligram figure, so nobody can give you a number from the label.

Should I stop something because of your "5 prescriptions" headline?

No. Not on your own, and not because of an advertisement. Take everything you take to your pharmacist and ask whether anything is a poor fit for your age.

Which line on the panel has the best support?

The grape-derived resveratrol. Its study ran 26 weeks in 46 healthy overweight adults aged 50 to 75 at 200 milligrams a day, and the panel prints 150. ^[6] It is also the only one of the three whose study measured memory at all.

Is anything in this chew a problem with what I take?

Possibly two things. Beet powder is sold for its dietary nitrate, which the body turns into a widener of blood vessels, and resveratrol can affect how some blood-thinning products work. Take the pouch to your pharmacist before the first chew.

Will the beet turn anything red?

It can turn urine and stool pink or red for a day, harmlessly. It startles people who were not expecting it.

How much sugar is in it?

Two grams of added sugar and 20 calories a chew, from tapioca syrup and raw cane sugar, with a stevia extract alongside them.

What exactly do the 30 days cover?

A full refund of the purchase price, minus shipping or other charges, within 30 days of the order date, with the pouch accepted used or unused, returned in good condition and in its original box where possible.

If your own headlines are exaggerated, why should I believe this page?

A fair question. Do not take our word for it. The references below are real, published sources you can look up yourself, and nothing in sections 4 and 5 requires you to buy anything or trust us. If this page and our headlines disagree, believe this page.

Does this page cost anything?

No. There is nothing to sign up for, and you are welcome to read it, close the tab and never come back.

Can I check these claims myself?

Yes, and you should. Every numbered reference below can be found by searching its authors and journal. For general information, the National Institute on Aging (nia.nih.gov) publishes plain-language material and sells nothing.

References

These are the sources behind the claims marked with a number above. Several are observational studies, which can show association but not cause. The resveratrol study ran in overweight adults at a third more than this panel prints; the beet study was a single day of nitrate-rich eating with juice, measured on a scan; the coffee fruit study was a single dose in ten people per group measuring a protein in blood; the grape-extract trials tested a different preparation and carried authors connected to its maker; the blueberry trial used a concentrate, not a flavoring; the fact sheets are the governments' own. None of them tested this chew. We have deliberately not cited anything for the claims we describe as exaggerated, because there is nothing to cite.

1. Topiwala A. et al. (2017). BMJ 357:j2353 doi.org
2. Gonçalves N.G. et al. (2023). JAMA Neurology 80(2):142-150 doi.org
3. US FDA Consumer Update. "Spilling the Beans: How Much Caffeine Is Too Much?" (updated 2024-08-28) fda.gov
4. Mantantzis K. et al. (2020). Psychology and Aging 35(4):517-528 doi.org
5. Edmonds C.J. et al. (2021). Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics 95:104380 doi.org
6. Witte A.V. et al. (2014). Journal of Neuroscience 34(23):7862-7870 doi.org
7. Presley T.D. et al. (2011). Nitric Oxide 24(1):34-42 doi.org
8. Reyes-Izquierdo T. et al. (2013). British Journal of Nutrition 110(3):420-425 doi.org
9. EFSA Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition and Allergies (2015). Scientific Opinion on the safety of caffeine. EFSA Journal 13(5):4102 doi.org
10. Poly C. et al. (2011). American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 94(6):1584-1591 doi.org
11. Bowtell J.L. et al. (2017). Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism 42(7):773-779 doi.org
12. Barnes L.L. et al. (2023). New England Journal of Medicine 389(7):602-611 doi.org
13. NIH Office of Dietary Supplements. "Vitamin B12: Fact Sheet for Health Professionals" (updated July 2, 2025) ods.od.nih.gov
14. Calapai G. et al. (2017). Frontiers in Pharmacology 8:776 doi.org
15. Amone F. et al. (2024). Foods 13(18):2999 doi.org

Citing a study does not mean the study is about this product. The studies above tested one ingredient at a time, in other people, at amounts this chew matches only once, not the chew itself; none of the research tested HumanN (SuperBeets), sold by GNC Memory + Focus, and none of it supports it.

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