How Australian NaturalCare is tackling competitive supplements category

Online vitamins and supplements retailer Australian NaturalCare is tapping into demand for locally-manufactured goods, with its 100+ product range created in Australia.Beyond its e-commerce channel, ANC operates out of a retail space in North Ryde, Sydney, and recently secured Mr Vitamins as its first stockist, but the business has big plans to expand its stockist count and expand internationally.Mark McKenzie, general manager of ANC, shares an insight into how this competitive category is developing.Have you noticed increased demand for vitamins/supplements since the pandemic? And if so, what ones?Over the last year, Australian NaturalCare (ANC) has seen increased demand for vitamins and supplements across many different categories. Consumers have become more attuned to their specific needs and the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle. As a result, we have seen spikes in the need for immunity products like Vitamin C, echinacea and garlic vitamins, as well as products that support sleep quality, and help to relieve stress and anxiety.We have also seen a growing trend around inner beauty supplements and foods and have just recently expanded our range, launching our Marine Collagen range of Powders and Chews. What other big trends are you seeing in this space?We’re seeing trends develop in the way people are consuming and using supplements – nowadays people are more inclined to incorporate a powder into their daily diet, as opposed to a tablet. Because of this, there are a growing number of health-based food powders and drinks entering the market. Consumers are also opting to incorporate these products into their long-term daily routines, rather than taking them only for a few weeks or months at a time.Another growing trend is gut health, which is particularly relevant to consumers struggling with weight management issues as a result of highly processed and sugary food diets. We’ve found that the connection between our gut and overall health is increasingly important to our customers, and as a result, we are looking to introduce more products to the ANC range around this topic. ANC is always looking to continue supporting its customers, which in turn enables them to live well every day.The supplements market is increasingly competitive with many new players entering the market – how do you stay relevant with consumers?We are constantly looking at our product range to see how we can improve our offering. We work with a number of different research groups and our in-house naturopath team, to look at new and emerging research on natural ingredients, and how we can best utilise them in our products.We are always talking to our customers through our Sydney-based call centre, which has helped us understand what our customers want and need. We also make sure to engage with customers across our website and social media platforms.We’ve found that our constant endeavour to provide excellent health support to our consumers allows us to maintain relevance.How has the e-commerce side of the business evolved in recent times?We maintain an ANC brand-only store which is our flagship store for the business, and then a number of different marketplace stores (e.g. Amazon) which we use to develop our connection to consumers across the market. We continue to look at the space to make sure we remain current.What have been the biggest challenges there?The biggest challenge for the business is maintaining high-speed to market processes to keep up with consumers’ needs, so we are constantly developing and evolving our business offerings based on consumer feedback and data.Our recent re-launch of the ANC brand is based on this feedback, and we have focused on a few core areas to develop our product offering to ensure that it is the best in the market and backed by research. That is the reason for the focus on inner beauty with our Marine Collagen range, as well as the upgrades to some of our better performing products in sleep (Peaceful Sleep) and heart health (CoQ10 300mg Ubiquinol). We are all about providing great health products at affordable levels.How is the Asia business performing? Any big learnings there?For the Asian business, we are still in the early stages of development but have just secured an exciting partnership with eCargo for the Chinese market. We believe that to be successful in Chinese and the Asian markets; strong partnerships need to be developed to service consumer needs, as is the case in Australia. It is not about short-term trading, but alternatively how to develop products that service consumer needs for the long-term. To support this, ANC is developing the communication ecosystems to learn and build the ANC brand in these markets. It is an exciting and challenging journey.Are the needs of shoppers in Asia different from Australia? Are there different trends?We actually find that trends in Asia are similar to that of Australia. There’s a strong focus on inner beauty, sleep and gut health. However, within the Asian market, consumers prefer smaller portions, individual packaging and food formats like powders and gummies. Because of these trends, we are evolving our product offering to cover off these needs in the most user-friendly manner.