Vitamin Friends - Vegan Multivitamin & Iron for Kids - Daily Nutritional Support Gummies w/Ferrous Fumarate B-Complex, Vitamin C, Zinc, Biotin - Body Function & Anemia - Strawberry, (60 Day Supply)

Iron supplements for kids are difficult to find. Well, iron supplements that taste good! We, as a family, do not eat gelatin and settled on Flintstones for a while, (because it was what we could find, and what we could afford) but they started adding gelatin to their vitamins... they just snuck it in there, suddenly, and we stopped buying that product immediately. We needed a replacement and wanted something affordable and much healthier -- no artificial coloring, no preservatives, no gelatin/animal products, etc. I did a lot of research and decided to try this brand. My son (11) loves these! I tried one and there is a teeny bit of an aftertaste, but very slight... a typical metallic penny taste that comes with iron, but, again, very slight. The actual gummy texture and taste is just like Sunkist fruit gems! Some parents have complained about the sugar the gummies are dusted with. We make this part of my son's morning routine... iron gummy then brush your teeth. It's that simple. Good brushing practice! :) As for the nutritional issues others have mentioned.... read the label completely. It clearly states that 1 gummy is the serving size and there is an age break down for ages 2-4 and 4-adult. If your child is 2-4 years old, one gummy will satisfy 71% of the daily recommendation, whereas 1 gummy taken by someone 4 to adulthood meets 28% of your daily needs. If your kid is 4 and they are on the smaller side, or if your kid is "big for his age" you would go by weight, just like if you were giving them cold medicine or Ibuprofen. Also, you need to pay attention to all of the other vitamins included in this gummy as well, especially if your child (or you) is taking an additional multivitamin. You don't want to go over the daily recommended values, especially on iron. Vitamins should be treated like medicine... too much is a bad thing. It is a supplement... not a replacement. Ideally, iron should be from food first. I know that some people/kids have issues with texture, color, etc. and parents cannot get them to eat certain things... so the supplement is really important. Vital even. But, before I doubled the dose (or more), to try to get it up to 100%, I would meet with a doctor or nutritionist to ensure you don't over do it, especially if the child is around 4-years-old and in a transitional weight/age. Another thing to remember... iron should be taken with something like oranges, but not with morning cereal (should not be taken with calcium, milk, yogurt, etc.). We space out the iron by two hours from calcium and/or his multivitamin to ensure everything gets absorbed properly.

My kids love the taste of these iron gummies!

I have been iron anemic most of my life. I have searched for various ways to take iron supplements, because no matter what I try to eat it never seems to be enough. My problem with tablets, even long release ones, is my body would never absorb enough, and I'd end up flushing most of it down the toilet... literally. I got hooked on gummy vitamins for the rest of my daily intake, and thought, hey, maybe there is a Gummy Iron! Well, there are two of them, and I've tried them both. I have to say I like this brand SOOO much better. I take one Iron tablet in the morning with breakfast, and this one midway through the day with lunch, and I see no sign of wasted Iron anywhere. I am able to go back to donating blood (special blood type), so I am VERY happy with this product. For those who can't handle tablets on their stomach, I greatly recommend this as a change to your iron intake. Update May 10, 2017 The new formula did not go over well, mainly due to the lack of coating making the gummies sticky and unpalatable. I took the time to write Vitamin Friends directly, and was happily informed by Pat from their customer service department that they had heard our cries and were switching back to the old formula. And on top of that, she offered to send me a bottle of the old formula to replace the bottle of new that I had received. The new bottle came today and it looks and smells JUST like it used to, so I am happy once again. Like so many others I have to take this because pills just tear up my stomach, but this is gentle enough that it satisfies my stomach and makes my Dr happy because my iron count is up. So be patient everyone, the Old Formula is on its way back. Or you could go directly to the vendors site and contact them.

My six year old with Aspergers, who also has serious sensory issues and as a result doesn't eat but a few things, doesn't get anything at all with iron in it in his diet. His pediatrician referred us to a dietician, who was especially concerned about lack of iron, and unfortunately the multivitamin selection is either the hard multivitamins such as Flintstone style or the various gummies. Here's the snag: The Flintstone style hard vitamins have the right amount of iron, whereas *NOT A SINGLE ONE* of the gummy multivitamins have iron in them. We haven't been able to determine why exactly this is, but it is starting to look as if there is something about iron which is inherently difficult or impossible to incorporate into the typical gummy candy. The gummy vitamins taste pretty much like a gummy bear, but with the vitamin stuff mixed in. The consistency is even that of a standard gummy bear. So why not just give him the Flintstone vitamins? He hates them. He has had to gag them down, every time. He does love the gummy vitamins, but then he really NEEDS the iron. So the solution would seem to be to find a stand-alone iron solution and give him the gummy vitamin with it. But he's not going to like an iron tablet, and you may as well just give him a Flintstone vitamin if you were going to do that. The iron liquids are a candidate, but they reportedly taste bad and I'd have to really bury it in a large drink, which might still have enough taste that he's going to notice. Not to mention that if the drink is large enough to mask it, trying to get him to take that much liquid at once might be a problem. Then we find *this* product... and he actually LIKES IT. It isn't QUITE the same as a gummy bear -- it's stickier, and harder to get out of the bottle. That makes me continue to suspect the original hypothesis that it's hard to make a gummy out of iron. Maybe this substance either is something different that will contain the iron or it's the same stuff but this is what happens to it when you put iron in it. Anyway, the stuff is quite sticky, and they had to put sugar or something on each one to try to keep them from sticking together quite so badly. They're also a bit mushier than regular gummies. My son says they do have a bit of an odd taste, not quite like regular gummies, but he says he likes them enough better than the Flintstone vitamins that he's very happy to take them so that he doesn't have to go back to those. I'm giving it a 4 rather than a 5 because of the excessive stickiness and I expect that as the bottle gets low it's going to get harder to get them out. The shipping cost was so high that in order to qualify for free shipping I had to order several bottles -- and I've take a huge risk because I'm hoping the shelf life isn't bad. I'm hoping by the time I open bottles 2 and 3 they aren't a big mass of goo....

My son’s labs showed slightly low iron levels. He was 14 months and his pediatrician recommended a liquid iron. I did not want to consider the liquid iron as it would stain his full set of teeth. It took a few weeks for my son to accept this vitamin as he initially would have nothing to do with it. After a month of casually introducing it to him a few days out of the week he started liking it and eventually asking for it daily. He now will remind us for his vitamin and always asks if he can have more. Within two weeks of him consistently taking the vitamin daily his labs showed healthy iron levels. I recommend not pushing or forcing this onto kids, it’s ok if they don’t like flavor at first. Be patient, don’t make a big deal out of it, and they’ll likely warm up to taking it daily. Also, aside from natural fruit my son had not had sugar, candy, sweet tasting food prior to this vitamin so that likely impacted his dislike for the vitamin in the beginning.

Updated review 5/15/17 Vitamin Friends has returned to their Original Formula! Vitamin Friends responded to my email TWICE- offering a free bottle to get my feedback and kids' approval. These vitamins taste GREAT and are sugar coated again- and truly are the Original Formula. Look for packaging that says "Original Formula" - not "New advanced Formula". My daughter is extremely picky- and these are her favorite vitamins. I think they taste great. I am very impressed with the customer service proved by Vitamin Friends. This is a company that listens to feedback. Old review: New formula tastes bad-and no sugar coating= my kids won't eat these vitamins. My daughter is extremely picky. These WERE the only vitamins she liked - but the "new improved" formula changed the taste (really bad) and removed the sugar coating. I wish I could return these. I have sent an email to Vitamin Friends asking them to go back to the original formula.

I bought these for my 13 month old twins but unfortunately it says they are not recommended for children under 24 months. I read a ton of reviews, and looked at all of the pictures which showed 1-3 years as one of the daily values so I thought I was making a good purchase. Despite being concerned that it wouldn’t the adequate supplementing, I tried to salvage my purchase by splitting one of the gummies in half to divide between the twins, but these gummies are very firm and will require a full head of teeth to avoid choking. Perhaps this is why the bottle says not for children under 24 months; they need to update the description and stock photo to reflect this important detail.

My 8 year olds were iron deficient, and our pediatrician recmmended using an iron supplement. She actually recommended an Enfamily liquid iron supplement, which we bought first. My kids have never been picky about taking medicines, liquid or otherwise, but the taste of the Enfamil brand iron supplement was so terrible, we tried it in a variety of concotions, including orange juice, with yogurt, with a chaser of water, and nothing made getting the supplement down any easier. So, I gave up on the liquid, searched for alternatives and found these. Took a chance that they wouldn't be as detestable as the Enfamile version. They weren't. My kids like teh strawberry taste and take these with their daily vitamin every day. No muss, no fuss. Just for this fact alone, I'd give these vitamins 5 stars, but the iron suppement is lower than the liquid, meaning I need to give my kids two each a day, and with only 60 in a bottle, I find the price to be a bit high.