🗂 Overview

By now we’ve probably all heard about gut health - it is the definition of a booming trend. It’s been on a solid upwards trajectory for the last couple of years. In that time, there has been an immense amount of content published about the importance your gut plays in your overall health.

Popular health experts such as Andrew Huberman talk about gut health at length and products like Athletic Greens have become increasingly popular due, in part, to their gut health benefits.

As you’d expect with a trend going this hard, especially one in the supplement industry - there are a lot of competitors. But it’s also such a big industry that niching down is still insanely lucrative.

I’ll break down some opportunities you can look into further down in the newsletter. Not all of them rely on you starting a supplement brand and none of them require you to spend millions in R&D.

📈 Stats

• The global supplement industry was valued at over $160 billion (USD) in 2022

• It’s expected to be worth over $350 billion (USD) by 2030

• The Asia-pacific region had just under 35% revenue share for this market in 2022

• Tablets currently dominate the market in terms of form with a revenue share of 33.27% in 2022

• Gummies are projected to record a significant CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 11.5%

• Liquid supplements are anticipated to witness the highest revenue-based CAGR of 12.2%

🧮 Trends

⭐️ Examples

• Athletic Greens have seen explosive growth in recent years and are one of the most well-known supplement brands promoting gut health.

• Myota is another brand that has exploded recently promoting trendy-looking gut health supplements.

• The Gut Co created multiple solutions to improve gut health.

• Gut Health Cookbooks like this one.

• Eaten Alive sells fermented foods like Kimchi

• Obvi, although not specifically for gut health, is one of the most talked about health brands in the DTC space at the moment.

💡 Opportunities

As mentioned, this is a massive industry with an insane number of competitors.

• Gut Health Supplements - Use a company like Supliful to quickly launch a supplement brand. In the resource section at the bottom of this email, I’ve included a list of more suppliers you can use to create supplements. They even have an accelerator program you can join to quickly launch a brand in 14 days - I have no idea if it’s any good though (I am not affiliated with these guys - just something I found when searching). They also offer logo, packaging and web design services separately.

• Create an Atheltic Greens Competitor - This could be done in a number of ways. For example, you could create a formula specifically for gut health. Alternatively, AG have a large number of 1-star reviews on TrustPilot - the most common complaints I saw were about poor customer service, horrible taste, use of artificial sweeteners, allergic reactions, and a very high cost-to-reward ratio. If you can create a version that fixes these issues (it tastes good, is cheaper, doesn’t use artificial sweeteners and uses less allergenic ingredients) you could see some success. There are already some competitors that claim to do this but the market is still wide open and growing fast here.

• Gut Health Cookbooks - If you don’t want to go into the world of supplements, one of the other more popular ways to improve gut health is through creating better food. Create cookbooks with recipes designed to improve your gut health.

• Sell Fermented Foods - This can be foods like sauerkraut, plain yoghurt, kimchi, kombucha, natto, kefir or even drinking brine - Eaten Alive is a great example of a company selling fermented foods. They even have a subscription box. Look at what you could do better or differently compared to them - or just sell in a new market.

• Gut-Friendly Snacks - Here’s a list of gut-healthy snacks you can adapt. You could try creating cereal like ELEAT and Surreal but for gut health.

Other ideas:

• Gut health cooking classes

• Personalised gut health assessments

• Gut-healthy foods restaurant

• Gut health ebooks

🛠 How to build it

• As with most businesses, it’s a very good idea to have at least some knowledge of the industry you’re operating in. So first make sure you learn about gut health (and more in-depth than from just a podcast), as well as supplement manufacturing, nutrition, cooking, fermentation, etc (depending on what opportunity you go with).

• Make sure you are also aware of any legalities involving the sale and promotion of health products and supplements in your country and the countries you sell to.

• If you’re selling products via a website, the best option for that is Shopify - it has pretty much everything you will need built-in or in their app store.

• Make sure your brand design is on-point. Try and differentiate your brand from the stuff you can get at a supermarket or pharmacy.

• Partner with people that know what they’re doing if you don’t know what you’re doing. By that I mean, partnering with experts in the health industry and in particular the niche you go after or in something like manufacturing.

• You can also try partnering with influencers and using them as the face of the brand. Look at Emma Grede - she’s partnered with a few of the Kardashian on brands like Skims and Good American. Another example is Logan Paul and KSI for Prime. You don’t have to go that big, obviously, but find a medium-sized influencer that you get along with and that fits your target demographic.

 🚀 How to grow it

• Influencer Marketing - This should be one of your main channels. Most big DTC health brands have grown with the help of influencers be that Instagram models, athletic individuals, or actual health experts - I’d recommend a mix of both unless you’re going heavy on targeting a specific niche.

• Paid Social Ads - Running ads on TikTok & Meta is still one of the best and quickest ways to find new customers. Use the Meta and TikTok ad libraries to see what your competitors are doing.

• PPC Ads - Like Paid Social ads, running PPC ads on Google is a great way to get in front of high-intent users looking for a solution to their problem.

• Get in the Press - You can use tools like Brand Push or Qwoted. This company also helps small businesses get media coverage.

• Create Content on TikTok - look at brands like Obvi and Rheal Super Foods, and creators like Taste of Nutrition and Nick Bare Fitness.

• Publish Written Content - Create a blog that answers common questions related to your niche. This will help you rank on Google and build authority in your niche.

👍 Tips

• There are loads of aspects to gut health - try niching towards specific aspects, such as reducing inflammation, increasing beneficial bacteria, or supporting digestion.

• There are some massive players in the supplement and health industry. But don’t let that put you off - new brands are popping up all the time. Make sure you focus on solving a problem and differentiating yourself from what’s already out there. Do a lot of research before launching anything.

• Look at good and bad reviews for popular products in this space and create a product that solves people’s most common gripes whilst also maintaining their satisfaction.

📚 Helpful resources

Supplement Suppliers:

• Supliful

• Superior Supplement Manufacturing

• HTC Health

• UK Gummy Company

• Nutrition Formulators

• Private Label Nutrition

• Swedish Nutra

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