Mapping The Nutraceuticals World Nutraceuticals World

With rising interest in healthy aging, more people are looking for clinical research that supports products designed to help them live healthier for longer.

The coenzyme NAD+ is essential to the body's metabolic processes, but it declines with age, so supplements that boost NAD+ have garnered considerable attention in the scientific community.

ChromaDex, which is publicly traded on the Nasdaq, offers the consumer product brand Tru Niagen. This patented form of nicotinamide riboside (NR) is a precursor to NAD+.

Tru Niagen sales totaled nearly $70 million last year, accounting for the majority of the company’s $83.6 million in revenue.

In this interview, ChromaDex CEO Rob Fried discusses NAD+ and emerging research, the company’s evolution to become a consumer-focused nutraceutical, the future of aging, critical challenges in today’s dietary supplement market, and more.

Spoiler alert: Fried is calling for more accountability and collaboration to enforce quality standards and establish greater trust with consumers.

In addition to being CEO of ChromaDex since 2017 and the founder of Tru Niagen, Fried is an Academy Award and Emmy Award winning motion picture producer. Before his combined 7 years in the health industry, he held senior roles at entertainment companies Savoy Pictures (CEO), Columbia Pictures (Executive Vice President) and Fried Films (founder, CEO). He has also founded and served as CEO of internet companies Feeln (now Hallmark Movies Now), WHN (a leading e-commerce service provider), and Healthspan Research LLC. 

In 2017, Fried led ChromaDex’s acquisition of Healthspan Research LLC, a consumer company offering Tru Niagen products, and raised funds with Horizon Ventures to offer Tru Niagen direct-to-consumer. He holds a BS from Cornell University and an MBA from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business.

Loren Israelsen from the United Natural Products Alliance shares insight on how agency priorities might change and how businesses can prepare.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is in process of a massive reorganization designed to streamline operations within a unified Human Foods Program (HFP) to largely replace the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN).

What does this mean for the dietary supplement industry?

In the proposal, now under review at Health and Human Services (HHS), the Office of Dietary Supplement Programs (ODSP) will report to a newly created “Office of Food Chemical Safety, Dietary Supplements, and Innovation,” (OFCSDSI), which FDA said “will work to modernize and strengthen oversight of food chemical safety, advance dietary supplement safety, and enable the Human Foods Program to support and effectively regulate food ingredient innovation.”

As the agency’s first Deputy Commissioner of Human Foods, Jim Jones is a 30-year veteran of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) with a deep background in chemical safety. Jones and his staff met last December with several major trade associations representing the supplements industry, including Loren Israelsen, founder and president of the United Natural Products Alliance.

I talked with Loren recently about FDA’s restructuring and how priorities might change under an overhauled Human Foods Program with new leadership.

— Sean Moloughney, Editor, Nutraceuticals World, nutraceuticals@rodmanmedia.com 
 

One of the biggest challenges for dietary supplements has been proving that products actually work. 
 
The traditional model for clinical research is expensive, slow, and not representative of diverse populations. As its name suggests, the company Radicle Science aims to address those concerns with a much different approach, leveraging new tools and technology.  
 
For this podcast we talked with founders Pelin Thorogood, executive chairwoman, and Dr. Jeff Chen, CEO, to learn more about their work and overall mission. 
 
If you’d like to offer feedback or suggest a topic, you can email us at Nutraceuticals@RodmanMedia.com

Born as a DTC multivitamin brand with strong focus on transparency, Ritual entered retail stores for the first time in 2022 with Whole Foods, and expanded in 2023 with Target and Amazon.
 
Now an omnichannel brand and a Certified B Corp, Ritual has expanded its menu of products to include a Synbiotic for gut health, as well as a Skin Hydration supplement called HyaCera. The company just launched its BioSeries extended release melatonin for sleep. 
 
Ritual has set some big goals as it relates to traceability and environmental footprint, and has conducted life cycle analyses to measure the carbon impact of all its products. To learn more we talked with the company’s Chief Impact Officer Lindsay Dahl .... 

Women In Nutraceuticals (WIN) is a nonprofit group established in 2022 with a mission to “empower women to unlock their personal and professional potential,” ultimately looking to “achieve economic and societal equity to change the global industry.” 
 
WIN recently conducted an industry Leadership Survey to get a global benchmark of where the industry is today in terms of gender equity. Results confirmed that women are underrepresented in senior leadership and executive boards. 
 
To learn more about the results we talked with WIN President Heather Granato, a 30-year veteran of the natural products industry, currently serving as vice president, partnerships and sustainability, in the Food EMEA division of Informa Markets.

To learn more about the survey results, read: Women In Nutraceuticals Leadership Survey Sets Representation Baseline
—Sean Moloughney, Editor 

Mushrooms seem to be everywhere, and in everything. Reishi, Shitake, Cordyceps, Lion’s Mane, Turkey Tail, Chaga, and others are all finding their way into dietary supplements and other nutritional products.

The closer you look at the Kingdom of Fungi, which is separate from plants, the more fascinating it seems to become.

To better understand the complexities of medicinal mushrooms, where this market is headed, and where it needs to go, I talked with Bill Chioffi, Chief Strategy and Innovation Officer for Nammex, which supplies organic certified mushroom extracts.

Bill has worked in the Natural Products Community since 1994 including with Gaia Herbs and the Ric Scalzo Institute for Botanical Research at Sonoran University of Health Sciences.

If you have questions or feedback send us a note at nutraceuticals@rodmanmedia.com.

Suggested Reading: A Kingdom of Their Own: Fungi Shine While Mushrooms Emerge as Market Stars

Questions and Topics Covered:

1:00 — Consumer interest in mushrooms has really exploded in the last few years or so. We see them in everything from traditional supplement capsules, to all sorts of food and beverage formulations, and on restaurant menus. What’s your sense of why this market seems to have gotten so hot so quickly?

2:49 — I’d appreciate your help in understanding some terms. First, what are the defining characteristics of a mushroom? Understanding they live within the Kingdom of Fungi, what makes a mushroom a mushroom as opposed to some other type of fungus?

7:53 — Are there other parts or terms associated with mushrooms that warrant attention or clarification? I also want to talk about substrates.

11:42 — From a regulatory and labeling standpoint, should myceliated grain be distinguished from a mushroom extract from a fruiting body? Are they different products?

14:36 — NAMMEX (North American Medicinal Mushroom Extracts) has been growing mushrooms for more than 45 years. The founder Jeff Chilton has been studying them even longer than that. NAMMEX extracts are made from certified organic mushrooms, grown naturally on substrate materials native to each particular mushroom. Can you explain your cultivation and processing methods and how this compares to what else is available on the market today?

19:30 — You’ve noted a clear need for more standardization. Can you explain the quality control standards and testing protocols NAMMEX has in place?

24:47 — Who should be involved in the process for developing official methods of analysis and what should that effort look like?

26:35 — There are so many different varieties of mushrooms all with their own history of use and potential health benefits. Where do you see the most runway for innovation?

29:44 — What’s the most fascinating species you’ve encountered?