FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif., Oct 20, 2006 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Alacer Corp., maker of Emergen-C(R), the leading branded Vitamin C, announced today the promotion of Bruce Sweyd to Vice President and General Manager of the newly created Tablet and Water Division.

Across his seven year career at Alacer, Sweyd has led the Sales and Marketing team, credited with tripling Alacer revenue and establishing Emergen-C as the dominant Vitamin C brand in Health and Natural stores. During 2005, Alacer initiated its first ever national radio and television advertising campaign under Bruce's direction. This investment in generating consumer awareness of the Emergen-C brand has led to substantial gains in the retail distribution in a wide range of food, drug and mass merchandiser retail outlets.

"Alacer's mission is to build on our legacy of innovation, bringing the world nutritionally enhanced products that support a healthy, active lifestyle," stated Ron Fugate, Alacer's President. "Sales of our Emergen-C brand drink mix have surpassed the $50 million mark, and we are firmly committed to more than doubling Alacer sales over the next five years. We see product forms beyond effervescent powder as critical to achieving our full potential."

Alacer has demonstrated a commitment to innovation with its unique fizzing lozenge products, marketed as Ora-Pops(TM) and the newly introduced Emergen-C Immune Defense(TM) lozenges. In the more traditional vitamin tablet segment, Alacer has leap-frogged its competitors with its breakthrough reacted mineral ascorbate formulation and its titanium dioxide free coating. "These forms and formulations are just the first wave of exciting new products from Alacer," reports Sweyd.
An additional area of opportunity for Alacer is in associating the company's brands more closely with the growing market for bottled water. Sweyd added, "American consumers spent almost $10 billion on bottled water in 2005, and we're excited about the potential to apply Alacer innovations to meeting consumer needs in that market."

As a measure of the importance placed on these growth opportunities, Alacer has formed a new division to give them the full focus of its leadership team. "The creativity, drive and entrepreneurial zeal that Bruce Sweyd demonstrated in his contribution to growing the core Emergen-C business makes him ideally suited for this critical new role," Fugate concluded.

Alacer develops and markets Emergen-C domestically and internationally. The product is sold in a variety of outlets, including Walgreens, Wal-Mart, Sav-on/Osco, Kroger/Ralphs, Albertsons, Vons, Smith's Food & Drug, Safeway, Trader Joe's, Fred Meyer, Fry's, CVS, GNC, Wild Oats, Whole Foods, The Vitamin Shoppe, and all fine health food, grocery, mass, and chain drug stores. For further information about Alacer, Emergen-C and other Alacer products, visit the web site at www.emergenc.com or call (800) 854-0249 or click here to check out the Alacer company profile.