Within a week, Sprouts reported over 800 units of sold, Shizu Okusa, founder, Apothékary, told FoodNavigator-USA. The brand officially launched in stores nationwide on Sept. 30. Apothékary also raised its first equity financing round from wellness founders, including Anne Mahlum of [solidcore], Andy Dunn of Bonobos and Steve Weiss of MuteSix.
For the last four years, Apothékary direct-to-consumer distribution served as an ideal model for its herbal powder business, Okusa said. Last year, Apothékary's rebrand looked at how new products could address treatment gaps which “fundamentally changed the entire business” through the introduction of tinctures.
The tinctures “provided a new format in the market that is … instantly dissolvable [and] incredibly potent with herbs because you still distill them versus freeze dry them with the powder. So … the potency per serving in the tincture is so much higher,” Okusa said.
Apothékary’s six tinctures are available in Sprouts’ vitamin department, including Take the Edge Off, Wine Down, Rosé-Tinted Glasses, Blue Burn, Mindcraft and The Honest Youth, addressing the non-alcoholic, ingestible beauty and superfood nutrition segments.
The company regularly engages with its consumer base, sending polls and surveys about new products and what other treatment areas they should address. Consumer surveys indicated that health food supplement stores were the preferred shopping destination for Apothékary’s products, rather than beauty stores like Sephora, Okusa said.
Direct distribution proved challenging but saved money and strengthened retailer relationships
Sprouts served as the ideal retail partner for the brand due to their consumer base who are “very focused on natural, clean supplements,” she said.
The retailer, which was reorganizing its supplement section to include emotional health, contacted Apothékary’s about its alcohol alternative products.
Rather than partnering with a national distributor that could “easily distribute our products for us,” the company opted “to take it on ourselves to ship directly to 400-plus stores,” Okusa said.
While direct distribution saved costs for the company and helped strengthen relationships with different stores, time and resources were a challenge, she said.
“It definitely took us a lot longer because we are not going through a central system. So lesson learned, but I do think ultimately it is still the right decision because we want to have a direct relationship with different stores and make sure that they are obviously supported, and we can also understand volume and numbers by store in real-time,” Okusa explained.
Standing out on shelves through beauty-inspired packaging, consumer education by staff
Apothékary applied its packaging from the beauty sector with its color-blocked design in vibrant earth tones, which sets it apart from the “pretty stale environment of supplements and vitamins,” on shelf, Okusa said.
The brand is currently developing different signage and displays over the next few months, she added.
One of the benefits of the retail partnership is working with staff on educating consumers about the product’s benefits, along with providing “a ton of education digitally that drives towards Sprouts.com,” Okusa explained.
The company will also focus on velocity, repeat rates and cross-selling, leveraging insights from digital sales to improve in-store experiences, Okusa added.
