The Future of Nutraceuticals 2022-2030: Industry Overview and Growth Drivers

The Nutraceutical Market Overview

The nutraceutical market is a broad category that includes functional foods and beverages, vitamins, food-derived and other dietary supplements, and other health and wellness products that can be obtained without a prescription. Though used for medicinal and health purposes, nutraceuticals are categorized as foods and thus can be easily purchased over-the-counter (OTC) in drug stores, supermarkets, and sports nutrition and vitamin stores. Several parallel and reinforcing economic and demographic factors are forecast to sustain growth in the market for the coming decade, maintaining decades of trends that have built this multibillion-dollar global sector.

Nutraceutical Market Growth Projections

Industry forecasts project the global nutraceutical market to expand from approximately $413 billion in the year 2020 to $720 billion by 2027, representing a CAGR of 8.26%. This projected market growth reflects increasing consumer desires to prevent disease, increase overall well-being, and take greater control of their own health.

Americans, for example, spent more than $35 billion annually on dietary supplements in recent years, in support of such goals as disease-prevention and healthy sexual function; the global marketplace for these products represents tens of billions of dollars more. An aging demographic of baby-boomers and Gen X consumers, for example, turn increasingly to nutraceuticals as an aid in promoting wellness and maintaining active lifestyles well into old age. Meanwhile, the younger millennial and Gen Z demographic segments, according to research, are less likely than older Americans to trust doctors and established medical providers, and more likely to use nutraceuticals and supplements for such health goals as supporting immune function, among others.

Nutraceuticals play a central role in the sports nutrition marketplace, where consumers in search of increased athletic performance such as muscle-building and weight loss were early adopters of consumer health products, among them supplements and protein shakes. The global sports nutrition marketplace, estimated at $43 billion in 2022, is forecast to approximately double by the end of the decade to reach $83.3 billion, for a CAGR of 8.5%.

Nutraceutical Market Drivers

The high costs of healthcare, prescription drugs, and health coverage—particularly in the United States—continue to drive the shift to non-prescription nutraceuticals as consumers seek to minimize spending on doctors and within the formal healthcare industry. The market for nutraceuticals has also grown along with increased awareness of traditional health modalities, such as Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). In 2018, for example, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced it would include TCM in its global reference source, the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems. Interest in these traditional modalities parallels the global shift towards natural/organic products by consumers seeking alternatives to prescription drugs.

The COVID-19 pandemic is simply the most recent event to drive global consumer focus on self-care. As people further empower themselves to optimize their own health and wellness, the market will be receptive to existing nutraceutical products and will fuel development of new research-based products in diverse product delivery systems, from capsules to chewables to functional beverages, among other technologies and innovations.

Notable Nutraceutical Market Companies

The growth trajectory in the Nutraceutical space represents a real opportunity for nimble, properly positioned companies in a variety of sub-sectors, from contract manufacturing to consumer brands.

• Herbalife (NYSE: HLF), a global nutrition company offering its nutrition and wellness products through an individual distribution model, recently announced their second year of record financial performance, which its management attributed to continued growing global demand for nutraceutical products.
• Mannatech, Incorporated (NASDAQ: MTEX), a pioneer in glyconutrition and a provider of aloe-based nutrition, health, and wellness products, saw year-end 2021 increases in net sales, net income, and gross profit.
• MediFast, Inc. (NYSE: MED), the company behind the OPTAVIA® health and wellness brand, has roughly doubled its quarterly revenues from 2020 to 2021 and boasts a roughly $2 billion market cap.
• Nature’s Sunshine Products, Inc. (NASDAQ: NATR), a manufacturer of natural herbal and nutritional products, recently reported a record quarter in Q4 of 2021; its sixth consecutive quarter of record net sales.
• Smart for Life, Inc. (NASDAQ: SMFL), a leading developer, marketer, and manufacturer of nutritional and related wellness products, recently made several major announcements, including that a number of its Doctors Scientific Organica-branded products had been selected by Amazon for its launch in Singapore. SMFL also announced that it had acquired Ceautamed, maker of the Greens First brand of nutritional products, and GSP Nutrition Inc., the exclusive licensee of the Sports Illustrated Nutrition brand of supplements.

NI will be tracking and reporting on the progress of these companies and other newsmakers in the nutraceutical space. We encourage you to subscribe to receive our email alerts, which will include company and industry news and analysis.

Yours Truly,

The Editors
Nutraceutical Insights