Digitalised and mature market: BYHEALTH extends Asia expansion with Singapore collagen gummy debut
The brand, which is a part of China health foods giant BY-HEALTH Co. Ltd, was introduced into Singapore in August via the health and beauty retail chain Watsons.
Starting with one of its bestsellers, the Cartidyss Collagen Gummies, the brand hopes to capture the women’s market, which it recognises as a key consumer group.
"We have looked into launching products with a beauty positioning to target the female consumers, who are likely to be more conscious of both health and appearance,” Jesse Gu, head of sales and marketing – BY-HEALTH International at BY-HEALTH Co. Ltd told NutraIngredients-Asia.
“As our collagen gummy is one of the hero SKUs in the Asian market, including China and Hong Kong, we [have thus] chose to launch this SKU first."
Manufactured in Australia, the collagen gummies contain 500mg of French-patented marine collagen sourced from concentrated fish cartilage extract, as well as Japanese rose extract, and apple polyphenol.
Price, place, product, and promotion are four important elements to consider when executing the product marketing plan, according to Gu.
“Thanks to Watsons, we were given the special top-shelf display across all Watson stores, its very eye-catching and we will have special new launch discount in the first month,” she said, adding that the launch was supposed to take place in March, but was pushed back due to COVID-19.
The brand had also wanted to launch in Singapore its other key SKU – the Flashnutri Iron Sachet – but was unable to due to regulatory restrictions. The product contains 17.6mg of iron powder per sachet, which has exceeded the permitted amount of 15mg per day.
“There is a growing ageing population in Singapore, which will result in increased demand for functional supplements that can benefit common health concerns such as heart and bone health issues.
“Ingredients such as calcium and omega-3 are also likely to gain in popularity as a result,” she pointed out.
She also explained that the brand had decided to launch in Singapore as it has a relatively mature nutraceutical market and a robust e-commerce scene – traits seen in the other markets which the brand is already present in.
“The forecast of the nutraceutical industry revenue in Singapore is SGD$1.6bn (US$1.2bn) by the year ending 2023.
“If you were to categorise the APAC countries [into different groups], Singapore belongs to the ‘mature followers’ group, which means that Singapore has a high digital disruption and high market maturity, which is similar to Australia.”
BYHEALTH’s international product range is available in Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, and mainland China.
Fragmentation
Gu also noted that Singapore’s nutraceutical market was highly fragmented, which required brands to stand out from the competition via innovative product design.
“Competition between supplement brands remain highly fragmented in Singapore, and consumers tend to be indecisive when making purchases, especially because brands tend to offer similar products.
“Therefore, it remains very critical for us to differentiate ourselves through new product development and aggressive marketing.
“For BY-HEALTH, we would like to invest in sales-oriented, mobile and fast marketing activities. We would like to ensure that each marketing activity will generate a reasonable sales return, helping the business to maintain a healthy cash flow and a good profit margin,” she said.
