Sale of dietary supplements almost even in the 3 largest channels

Not so long ago, the idea that natural supplement stores and stand-alone supplement stores would not dominate the supplement market at all seemed unthinkable, but as predicted 2024 Business Report Supplementthe sales channel picture developed for 2025 will broadly include both natural and specialty bricks and mortar for both e-commerce and mass market channels.

What will this mean for supplement industry is not yet clear, both in simple issues of distribution and pricing and in more complex ideas about how consumers discover new products. It is clear that market parity has been years in the making and has been greatly accelerated by the pandemic, and that it is time for retailers to offer products that offer natural and stand-alone supplements N.B.J defines as Natural and Special to up your differentiation game.

In the 2010s, natural and specialty retailing eclipsed e-commerce in supplement sales and far outpaced the mass market. For example, in 2018, Natural and Specialty stores had 36.6% of the supplement market share, compared to 6.7% for e-commerce and 27.1% for mass market. Then the 2020 pandemic hit and two things happened: ordering online became a reflex, and shopping in-store with a mask meant fewer consumers were willing to visit an independent supplement store again. In 2020, e-commerce sales increased by 32% and mass market sales by 14.7%. Meanwhile, natural and specialty products delivered growth of just 0.8%.

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Four years later, these habits seem set in stone.

Last year, Mass Market products overtook Natural and Specialty products in total sales. At some point in 2025 N.B.J expects three main channels come closer to parity than ever before, and in 2026 Natural and Specialty will be the smallest of the three.

Of course, this is not an end-of-game scenario. Supplements have never been an all-or-nothing game for sales channels. N.B.J Natural and Specialty supplements expect to sell $17.5 billion this year. Maintaining market share for retailers in this channel becomes a matter of promoting their service strengths and positioning as the most reliable supplier of high-quality supplements.

With new reports of counterfeit products on platforms like Amazon, some consumers will want to know that what they are buying is real. At the same time, the dizzying variety of little-known brands sold online are sure to worry some consumers. They would likely appreciate the curatorial role that retailers, especially natural retailers, play in ensuring that only proven products make it to the shelves.

Take a closer look at today’s supplement industry with Supplement to the 2024 NBJ Business Report.