A lot of people are curious about how we work, and how we create the products we create. It’s been a long journey of trial and error, so we thought we’d highlight some of the key points here below.
Amazon certainly has its own list of pros and cons, but one of the pros is that you can see a lot of products from a lot of different manufacturers all on one website.
Before Amazon, supplements were largely dispersed around the internet, in weird corners. The only way you could find them was through weird internet forums or chats. Perhaps you may have had a local store like a GNC or similar, but even their selection was – and is, still to this day – lackluster at best.
The first step is really understanding the supplement space as a whole.. and also understanding what PROBLEM people may be facing.
Thankfully for us at Formulation Factory, this is quite easy, because as active participants in the fitness world, we see and hear from a lot of people struggling and wanting to get more involved – to become healthier people. The problems we hear about are often times the best source of future products ideas.
No product is really created the same in a row… but their are always similarities. We can summarize a bit of the structure below for a rough idea.
- Identify the Problem – Identify a space where a problem exists but isn’t being met or solved appropriately or effectively.
- Market Analysis – look at amazon, social media, influencers, etc. to determine current market landscape. If entering a competitive space looking to just improve on products, this may include deeply analyzing currently products and their formulas.
- Product Formulation – once we have a bit of the lay of land, its important to formulate a variety of different ideas. This includes a lot of academic research using websites like PubMed, Medline, or the National Library of Medicine. This process is by far the longest and most resource intensive (both in time and cost). It is important to run in a few cycles here, and to always use deadlines to keep the ball moving forward. We leverage a lot of friends (or “guinea pigs”) during this process- often ordering a LOT of powders, breaking them up, shipping them around, doing unique 1 off testing, etc. Every human being is different, and we constantly see that what works for one person may not work for someone else, so you need to be aware of the tradeoffs you might have to make- product efficacy vs.
- Product Manufacturing – Once the formula is completed, and we test and validate in a small cohort, we will start to reach out to contract manufacturer (CM) who can quote us on the formulation. It is important to never rely solely on one manufacturing facility, and to always have them bidding against one another.
- Product Fulfillment – Once the product is created, you need to figure out how to market and ship it. This can be teaming with a 3PL (third party logistics) company, or even your manufacturer, or something like Amazon’s FBA, or shipping yourself. At this stage, marketing and sales are the number one goal so be sure to have a good basic understand of social media, running ads, etc. They will be the lifeline to your business.
This is very elementary explanation of how we created SELF OBSESSED, and how we plan to formulate future products, but, to go into full details would be an extremely lengthy endeveour. There are a lot of great websites out there like https://www.nutrasciencelabs.com/blog/whats-the-process-for-manufacturing-dietary-supplements which gives even more detail on how to formulate a product.
And of course, if you want to learn more, or have any questions about our Products, SELF OBSESSED, or what might be coming down the line, reach out to us on our Contact Page.
