The agency, which encompasses a shopper dealing with model and contract manufacturing arm, goals to supply shoppers with the last word in personalization by launching a variety of complement powder blends, alongside empty capsules and capsule filling machines.
“In the mean time, if somebody desires to make a complement mix for immunity or vitality or sleep, they’ve to purchase the separate elements and work out how a lot to take of every,” Ben Blackburn, CEO of Life Lab, informed NutraIngredients.
“Our new stack pack starter kits shall be £20 and supply the powdered mix and the empty capsules, together with the capsule filling machine, capsule organizers and containers to maintain them in as soon as they’re made. This can permit them to make their very own dietary supplements at house at about 50% cheaper than shopping for a product within the store.”
Deliberate for launch in early August, the brand new providing will permit shoppers to make 25 capsules in lower than 10 minutes.
“They’re doing a little bit of the manufacturing course of themselves,” Blackburn stated. “We train them in regards to the elements, and so they can tweak them a bit to swimsuit their wants. For instance, in the event that they’re a vegan they could wish to add some B12.”
The stak pack blends will cowl a variety of key well being considerations, corresponding to magnificence, intestine well being, vitality and immunity.
The brand new launch comes within the agency’s twentieth 12 months of buying and selling, following a very profitable 12 months thanks largely to its rebrand in 2023 which heralded a 35% progress in buyer base and 15% improve in turnover.
“The title ‘Life Lab’ goals to tell shoppers we’re enhancing their life by our laboratory,” Blackburn stated. “The core is the science so we needed to emphasise that.”
This coincides with enlargement to a brand new, bigger manufacturing facility, enabling the enterprise to broaden its manufacturing providing, and rising manufacturing capability of capsule merchandise by 268%.
With the rebrand, the enterprise additionally created two devoted web sites and identities for the consumer-facing model and the contract manufacturing aspect which Blackburn stated has helped progress on each side.
“This previous 12 months has been transformational for our enterprise when it comes to capitalizing on the excessive ranges of progress within the dietary supplements sector,” he added.
Humble beginnings
Blackburn arrange the agency when he was a college pupil, merely to have the ability to present his grandmother with a diabetes-friendly sweetener that was not stocked in shops.
“My grandmother requested me to get her this particular diabetic sweetener however no-one was promoting it,” he stated. “I discovered a producer making it, however they solely offered to companies. Just a few weeks later I bought again in contact and stated ‘I’m Blackburn Distributions, can I purchase 25 kilos of sweetener?’”
He offered the sweetener to a lot of clients and slowly constructed the portfolio from there.
“I didn’t have a plan,” he stated. “I noticed the nice demand round weight reduction and calorie management—that’s what a lot of individuals took this sweetener for—so I expanded into that space initially with dietary supplements like guarana and theobromine.”
In 2013, the enterprise expanded into contract manufacturing, and by 2018 turnover for this aspect of the enterprise was rising 85% year-on-year.
The now international enterprise, boasting a group of twenty-two workers and a turnover of £2.5m a 12 months, manufactures a full portfolio of dietary supplements, from nutritional vitamins and minerals to core sports activities vitamin staples, botanicals, mushrooms and different natural alternate options.
The model appeals to the extremely motivated and invested well being shoppers who spend numerous time researching elements and know precisely what they need, Blackburn defined.
“We attraction to individuals with allergic reactions or particular dietary requirement, individuals very devoted to their sports activities, who would possibly wish to purchase in bulk and take bigger portions of the dietary supplements,” he stated. “They have a look at the elements within the blends they will purchase in retailer and understand they will purchase the elements in bulk for a fraction of the fee with out compromising on high quality.”
Discussing how the market has modified, he added: “Within the time I’ve been working on this area I’ve seen shopper curiosity pivot from the substitute, pharmaceutical stimulants, spherical to the pure and natural alternate options. Individuals are actually seeing elements which have conventional use in different cultures, and they’re open to attempting new elements.”
He famous a few of the finest sellers within the consumer-facing vary are the elements targeted on feminine well being help, together with MSM, magnesium and mushroom extracts.
