ABOUT 60 years ago, Hollis Osborne bought a feed supply business at the border of Missouri and Arkansas and built it into one of the country's five largest commercial egg producers: Moark LLC.
Osborne was always concerned about the waste generated in the operations, particularly broken eggshells from the company's breaker (further-processing) division, a lot of which could be field applied but a lot of which went into landfills.
Accordingly, he started working with scientists from area colleges to determine if there was a value-added solution to the eggshell situation.
There was.
Osborne learned that naturally occurring proteins in the eggshell membrane have healing properties for joint pain and that the eggshell itself contains one of nature's most easily absorbed and purest forms of calcium for bone strength.
This discovery led to the establishment of ESM Technologies in 2002 to market bone and joint health products from the eggshell membrane and the eggshell itself.
"So, we're a young company that's 60 years old," said ESM president Micah Osborne, the grandson of Hollis Osborne who began running the company in 2003.
Micah Osborne and Dr. Kevin J. Ruff, director of scientific and regulatory affairs, talked with Feedstuffs about ESM at its headquarters in Carthage, Mo.
Patented process
The membrane is a thin film inside the eggshell that's bound hard to the shell.
ESM has developed a patented process to remove the membrane and dry it into a powder, which it calls NEM for Natural Eggshell Membrane, and then sells it to pharmaceutical companies that encapsulate the powder and market the product as a dietary supplement for joint health for people.
In addition, there is a chewable, liver-flavored tablet for dogs and a product that's mixed into feed for horses.
ESM also dries the eggshells into a powder -- ESC for Eggshell Calcium -- through a similar process and encapsulates and markets it for bone health.
The company processes 15,000-20,000 lb. of shells per day.
ESM also contracts encapsulated product that's returned and marketed by its own company, Membrell.
Natural products
NEM is unique in that it is a natural product, Micah Osborne said, while other joint pain relief products are completely synthetic or produced through harsh chemical processing.
"A lot of the time, you hear about some guy in the jungle who tripped over a root, and it turns out to be a miracle root that's needed for a miracle drug, but we just looked in the refrigerator and found this," he said.
This is one of the factors that distinguishes NEM from similar products, he said: "It comes from a trusted source. People have had eggs and eggshells in their refrigerators and on their tables forever. Eggs have been a trusted source of nutrition for a long, long time."
Also distinguishing NEM from other products, Osborne said, is the fact people start feeling a reduction in pain and stiffness from taking one small pill once per day for 7-10 days (Figure), whereas other popular products are larger pills that need to be taken three to four times per day for 30 days to begin producing results.
Many people who have joint pain also are elderly and have to take a lot of pills for a lot of ailments every day, he noted, so NEM helps minimize the quantity of pills for at least one problem.
Indeed, Ruff said NEM's efficacy and safety have been documented in three clinical trials and published in two medical journals, which also distinguished the product from its counterparts. ESM can show that NEM remains safe even at 50 times the normal dose, he added.
ESC also is natural and unique versus counterpart products, Osborne claimed, explaining that eggshells are comprised of calcium carbonate in its purest form and that this calcium is readily absorbed into the bones when administered as an ESC supplement. Other calcium sources are commonly mined from the ground and may contain several impurities, he said.
Osborne said the company goes to great lengths to produce its products in two plants with high standards for recordkeeping and safety and processes that are certified by third-party verification.
He added that ESM can track any bottle of pills back to the plant from which the eggshells came and the farm from which the eggs came and runs a mock recall once every year.
"We've never had to do that (traceback), but we want to know that we can," he said.
The company sources eggshells from eggs that only come from table-egg flocks, not from other kinds of poultry. The shells are sourced primarily from one local breaking plant, but ESM does occasionally source from other plants in the Midwest.
Business, need growing
Osborne said ESM buys more eggshells every year, "so our business is growing, but so is the need."
Not only are more pharmaceutical companies switching to ESC and NEM because of their benefits, but the population is aging and growing more aware of the need to eat healthfully and of the health benefits of dietary supplements, he said.
An ESM fact sheet notes that more than 140 million adults in the U.S. suffer from some form of connective tissue or joint disorder such as arthritis, gout, lupus, fibromyalgia, back pain or neck pain and that the most prevalent form of arthritis -- osteoarthritis -- affects almost 27 million adults, including more than one-third of people 65 years of age and older.
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