GNC rolls out personalized vitamin pack subscription service

17-Oct-2019 - Last updated on 17-Oct-2019 at 15:07 GMT

Called GNC4U, the new monthly subscription service from GNC is based on recommendations gleamed from individual health needs, lifestyle goals, and DNA analysis.

The GNC4U DNA Test Kit (powered by Vitagene) costs $89.99, while pricing for the monthly subscription service is not currently disclosed. Supplement recommendations are based on an individual's age, gender and personal and family health history, according to a press release from the company.

In addition to the vitamins and supplements, GNC4U provides an in-depth diet and exercise program customized for a consumer's individual wellness needs and designed for what their bodies require to achieve peak performance, added the company.

Vitamin Shoppe, too

The GNC subscription offering comes hot on the heels of a similar product from The Vitamin Shoppe, which launched its Only Me monthly subscription service last month (September, 2019).

Vitamin Shoppe’s service, which starts at $20 per month, uses a detailed questionnaire about current health status and daily routines to design an individualized wellness plan.

GNC’s service appears to potentially go further by offering by allowing consumers to share genetic information via a GNC4U DNA Test kit or provide previously sourced DNA information.

“When it comes to wellness, everyone has different aspirations that no single nutrition plan, exercise routine or vitamin and supplement regimen can help achieve,” said Ryan Ostrom, Chief Brand Officer, GNC Holdings, Inc. “For over 80 years, GNC has been a leader in innovative offerings for living well, and GNC4U is just the first step in our quest to provide the most personal nutrition solutions for today's consumer.”

How it works

Step 1 in the GNC4U process is for consumers to sign up to take a free lifestyle quiz, which focuses on wellness, sports nutrition and weight management. Then based on these responses, scientists at GNC build a customized vitamin and supplement, exercise and nutrition plan which can be accessed in their personal online wellness dashboard. Here, consumers order their personalized daily packs, which arrive with the consumer's name on them.

New 30-day supplies are automatically shipped every month.

According to GNC: “While packs are tailored to each individual, all packs will include up to eight different vitamins and supplements, which are divided into once or twice daily packets.”

Disruptive?

Commenting on the new development, CPG expert Joshua Schall from J. Schall Consulting told us that while personalized nutrition is heating up with large CPG portfolios and retailers like GNC and The Vitamin Shoppe getting into the business, “its current application is far from the truly disruptive force it will become in the future.”

The offering by both GNC and Vitamin Shoppe are not disruptive, he said. “They are mostly a way for them to acquire customer data to add personalization layers to marketing and additionally to feed data into larger product suggestion algorithms. Additionally, it helps them lock you into their retail brand and provide reoccurring revenue.

“This is no knock on GNC or The Vitamin Shoppe as many other functional CPG brands in the VMS categories is doing very similar things…from Care/of, Gainful, and many others.”

Compare this to Habit, he said, which was acquired by Viome earlier this year, both of which are “pushing us closer to true personalized nutrition, but we still have a great deal to go in my mind.”

“To really advance our personalized nutrition offerings we will need to see strategic partnerships with health, food/beverage, technology companies to complete the loop with software, hardware, food production and a number of other big challenges.”