superfood brands

Neither the IQ tax rumored on the Internet will kill you as soon as you step on it, nor is it a golden track to make money while lying down. Brands that can survive for more than three years and earn real money have only taken two paths - either to provide precise functional solutions for vertical groups, or to provide affordable daily supplements for the public table. The fuzzy routes in between basically cannot survive.

To be honest, I have friends who have experienced the pitfalls of the middle route. In 2020, he led his team to make a brand of kale powder. At first, he was greedy for too much. At one time, he promoted to the fat-reduction party that "one pack of vegetables can help you lose 3 kilograms a week." The products were neither high nor low, with a pack of 300g selling for 69. As a result, the fat-reducing party found it too expensive and preferred to buy their own vegetables and make salads. The elderly thought it was too flashy and didn’t believe in Internet celebrity products. After a year and a half, they lost more than 2 million yuan, so they simply closed the store and returned to their old employer to work as product managers.

There are many people who have stepped into this pitfall, and gradually the industry has differentiated into two completely different ways of playing. Don't tell me, a Shenzhen team I contacted last year has taken the vertical route. They have never touched the mass market from the beginning. They specialize in superfood combinations for women preparing for pregnancy and early pregnancy. The ingredient list is so clean that it only has organic beetroot powder, selenium-rich chia seeds, and freeze-dried red amaranth powder. They don't even add sugar substitutes. They just supplement natural iron and folic acid. A set of 7-day quantities sells for 199. Can you believe that the repurchase rate can reach 42%? They don’t even invest much in the public domain. They rely entirely on private domain referrals from obstetricians and maternal and child vertical bloggers. Many users have accumulated more than 100,000 highly sticky private domain users from pregnancy preparations to lactation in more than a year. Last year, they sold 80 million, and their profit margins are more than double that of many mass-category brands. Of course, there are many voices of opposition. Many people in the industry feel that the ceiling of this model is too low, and it will not reach 1 billion in annual sales within three to five years. It is better to mass-market products and start volume faster. But if you ask the founders of this team, they don’t care at all and just stick to these precise users. This year, they also plan to add product lines related to postpartum Qi and blood repair, which is very stable.

Taking the completely opposite route to them is a food factory in Shandong. It used to process superfoods for overseas brands. In 2022, it started to produce its own brands, taking a completely affordable route. Freeze-dried blueberry powder costs RMB 19.9 per pound, which is about the same price as ordinary soy milk powder. Organic quinoa rice costs RMB 39 for a 5-pound package, which is cheaper than many bulk grains. It can be purchased directly from community supermarkets and Pinduoduo subsidizes tens of billions of dollars. Even anchor commissions are kept to a minimum. Last year, it sold RMB 270 million through all channels. When their boss was having a drink with me, he said that super foods are, to put it bluntly, ordinary ingredients with a higher nutritional density. They were previously promoted as exclusive to aristocratic ladies and were often priced seven to eight times higher. He wanted to bring the price down so that ordinary people could add them to porridge and milk without feeling distressed. Of course, the problems with this path are also obvious. It is too easy to fall into a price war. In the second half of last year, a bunch of small factories followed suit, adding half of the maltodextrin to the powder and selling it for 9.9 per pound, which made many consumers unable to distinguish good from bad. This year, he plans to add a traceable QR code to all products. By scanning it, you can see the cultivation base and test report of the raw materials, and he wants to filter out the slanderous ones.

What’s interesting is that there are still a group of players who don’t follow the concept of superfoods hyped in Europe and the United States at all. Not long ago, I was attending a food exhibition in Hangzhou and came across a brand from Fujian that adopted the concept of "Oriental Super Food". It mainly featured organic iron bar yam powder and basswood organic tremella soup. Even the slogan was "Our ancestors have eaten good food for thousands of years, and it is no better than what they have eaten across the ocean." "The kale from overseas is worse", and people don't exaggerate its functions. They just say "make a cup when you have an upset stomach, which is healthier than drinking milk tea." Last year, the Douyin live broadcast room alone sold 120 million yuan. Many people bought it for breakfast for the elderly at home, and the repurchase rate can reach more than 30%.

The most controversial topic in the industry right now is whether superfoods are IQ taxes. In fact, to put it bluntly, consumers think it is an IQ tax, and they are not criticizing the superfood itself, but those unscrupulous brands that claim that ordinary quinoa can fight cancer and lose 5 pounds a week, and sell it at a 10 times premium. When I was doing user research before, I met a 996 office worker who said that she catches the subway every morning and makes a packet of kale powder to take to work, which saves time and money compared to ordering a light salad that costs more than 20 yuan. She just wants to make up for her insufficient vegetable intake every day. She also knows that this thing cannot lose weight, so it is just for convenience. This kind of real small need is no problem in the first place.

I have been working in the fast-moving consumer goods industry for 10 years, and I have seen too many trends rise and fall. In fact, is there any natural super category? It can really solve the small needs of users without making people waste their money. Whether you are vertical or affordable, you can become a super brand that can stand up. Those who chase trends, speculate on concepts, and make quick money every day, no matter what track they are involved in, will eventually fail.