The Queens of Calcium in Ithaca, Local Spotlight: Seen Nutrition

The month of May is dedicated to Osteoporosis Awareness and Prevention Month, making this issue of GreenLeaf Quarterly a fitting time to feature Seen Nutrition, which has produced the first and only dietary calcium chew on the market developed by Ithaca residents, Dr. Adrienne Bitar and Dr. Jennifer Han.

Adrienne, a food studies lecturer at Cornell University and Jenny, a former clinical pharmacist both hail from the Bay Area, California and found their careers and homes in Ithaca. The two bonded over shared concerns regarding osteoporosis. Jenny endured an extremely rare condition after the birth of her child, known as pregnancy-lactation osteoporosis, which caused her multiple back fractures. Adrienne’s mother was diagnosed with osteoporosis at the age of 47 after a failed knee replacement.

“Osteoporosis is known as the silent disease,” Adrienne explains. “There may not be noticeable symptoms until you break a bone. Whether or not you’re consuming enough calcium to supply your body what it needs every day, your body will still pull calcium from your bones, leaving them weak, brittle, and vulnerable to fractures and breaks. Calcium can be difficult to build back up when you’re at a deficit, so preventing calcium loss from bone is extremely important.”

The recommended dietary allowance (RDA) for calcium for women between 19 and 50 is 1,000 mg. For post-menopausal women, or women over 50, the need increases to 1,200 mg. Calcium is best consumed through foods like leafy greens, dairy, and foods fortified with synthetic calcium such as orange juice, but consuming the recommended amount can be challenging, especially for those with dairy aversion or avoidance and smaller appetites. While there are tons of options for synthetic calcium from pills to gummies, many contain dyes, sugars, and may not be as easily absorbed by the body. About 27 million American women use calcium supplements and it’s estimated that one-third consequently experience digestive issues.

“Many customers share with us that this is the only calcium they’ve tried that doesn’t disrupt their digestive regularity,” Adrienne said.

Seen Calcium Chews are easier on the stomach, because they are made to offer superior bioavailable calcium, vitamin D, phosphorus, magnesium, and protein.

Adrienne and Jenny use just 4 simple, but super powerful ingredients, such as local milk from Cayuga Milk Ingredients, a farmer cooperative based in Auburn comprised of 32 dairy farms within a three-county radius.

The chews also contain Vitamin D mushrooms grown under special conditions by a mycologist in northern Pennsylvania and US-grown dates and almonds. Each 25-calorie chew offers 500 mg of calcium, equivalent to 150 almonds (more than 1,000 calories) or 1.6 cups of whole milk (about 240 calories).

If you were imagining Adrienne and Jenny in a kitchen with bowls and wooden spoons working on the first iteration of the chew, it was indeed a bit like that.

“We experimented at home for a while and it took us a lot of iterations,” Adrienne said. “When we had a better sense of the formula, we were able to take the next step. We were fortunate to be sponsored by the Dairy Runway Program to work with the Cornell Center of Excellence for Food and Agriculture in Geneva to help get the product to market.”

Seen Nutrition was incorporated in 2023 and Adrienne and Jenny won a $500,000 award in the 2025 Grow-NY competition to expand their operations. They focus on local ingredients (as much as possible), local manufacturing, and local business. “I don’t know if we could have accomplished this anywhere else,” Adrienne said. “This area offers agricultural and local entrepreneurs support and food science resources.” Seen’s administrative office is currently located in the Cornell Business & Technology Park in Lansing. The chews are made in Rochester at Holy Childhood, a vocational program for adults with developmental disabilities. Seen has also worked with Glen Co-pack in Watkins Glen, a local employment program for people with developmental disabilities, to fulfill their subscription mail orders.

Adrienne and Jenny both serve on the Medical Advisory Committee for the National Menopause Foundation and are corporate advisors to the Bone Health and Osteoporosis Foundation, fully committing to promoting bone health for women.

Medical providers, fitness, and nutrition professionals are recommending Seen chews to women seeking to curb calcium deficiency. Thousands of people across 50 states are now ordering Seen Nutrition chews to be delivered directly to their door, but locally, people can purchase these tasty supplements exclusively at Cornell Pharmacy or GreenStar Food Co+op.

“We are proud to work with GreenStar and it seemed the obvious choice for a local retail location,” Adrienne said. “The co-op aligns with our values, much of our customer-base is shopping here, and both Jenny and I are GreenStar shoppers too.”