the Joshua Schall Audio Experience

What if I told you there’s a 23.75 percent chance the supplement industry will be unrecognizably annihilated in the next year? While I don’t want this to be a “sky is falling” moment that creates panic and mass hysteria, we do need to walk through a very scary…very plausible “black swan event” that would completely disrupt the supplement industry as we know it today. I’ve been modeling out probabi...

Glanbia is certainly making that cheddar…figuratively and literally, but which GPN brand has been cutting the cheese lately? Glanbia Performance Nutrition is one of two wholly-owned segments of Glanbia plc (LON:GLB), a multi-billion dollar global nutrition company. The brands in the Glanbia Performance Nutrition portfolio include; Optimum Nutrition, BSN, think!, Isopure, Amazing Grass, and SlimFas...

Love it or hate it…artificial intelligence (AI) has started to take over different areas of our lives and there’s no escaping it. While everyone is talking ChatGPT, I’ve been captivated by another AI revolution that has just started to impact the CPG industry. Did you know that some of the "influencers" you follow might not even be real? I mean its common knowledge by now that influencer...

The Chapter 11 bankruptcy era of the beverage empire that Jack Owoc built has been wild. A LOT more has happened since I uploaded my last major Bang Energy bankruptcy explained update in mid-March (https://youtu.be/Kr_PMyydlCw). But that probably shouldn’t surprise you at this point, right? If you remember, I stuck my neck on the line and said that Monster Energy would end up acquiring its hated r...

Maybe it’s a bit extreme to say that the global supplement market sees American industry stakeholders as disorder-level narcissists, but at one point in the not so long-ago history it was probably very true. As dynamic forces from borderless digital platforms and online marketplaces continue to disrupt the supplement industry, it’s more important than ever that brands with global ambitions must ha...

It’s “spring cleaning time” at The Clorox Company…and unfortunately throwing away about a billion dollars’ worth of supplement brand acquisitions might make sense! My guess is A LOT of you didn’t even know that The Clorox Company owned a collection of supplement brands…let alone ones that in aggregate cost the CPG company just under a billion dollars to acquire. Why would a CPG portfolio that was...

AB InBev has GHOST Energy. Molson Coors has ZOA Energy. Heck…Monster Energy acquired CANarchy craft brewing collective. And now the third-largest craft brewer in America, Sierra Nevada Brewing, has acquired a minority stake in the better-for-you energy drinks brand RIOT Energy. If you haven’t picked up on it…brewing companies are targeting pockets of beverage industry growth potential to replace t...

Grammy-nominated Hip Hop artist Jack Harlow recently invested in a beverage company based in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky…but did he choose the right one? When you think about Kentucky and CPG…what comes to mind? Bourbon, right? The dozens of distilleries that make up the Kentucky Bourbon Trail are visited by a few million annually and the State has more than 11 million barrels of Bourbon...

If you look a mess, you are a mess. Right or wrong, books are judged by their covers and so are CPG brands. So, what does your products’ shelf presence say about your CPG brand? A LOT…actually! The store shelf is often a shopper’s first point of interaction with your products and its appearance can make or break the sale. But how do you keep everything looking tidy throughout the day at 1000s of s...

With New Years revolutionists flooding the market, January is typically the best month for the two largest specialty supplement retailers. Yet, January 2023 might have been a bit different because both GNC and The Vitamin Shoppe had CEO departures. After more than four years, Sharon Leite left The Vitamin Shoppe to become the CEO of Ideal Image (North America’s market-leading aesthetic services br...

Did you know there’s a new resident DJ…I mean CEO at The Simply Good Foods Company? And does that mean there’s about to be cake thrown at competitors of Quest Nutrition and Atkins Nutritionals soon? In this latest episode, I'll utilize the 2023 Q2 Simply Good Foods Company (NASDAQ: SMPL) earnings report, earnings call, and supplemental presentations that were filed on 4/5/2023 as the backdrop...

Pivotal is an interview-style segment that tackles topics in consumer packaged goods (CPG) and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) from the business leaders that live it EVERY DAY! As we close out another exciting quarter within the functional CPG space, it only seemed right that I ask my good friend and Market Insights Director at SPINS, Scott Dicker, to join me again. Instead of doing another broa...

Sway House was started in January 2020 after the TikTok talent management company, TalentX Management, essentially chose a handful of its influencer clients to live in a Bel Air mansion rent-free and collaborate on videos for the various digital platforms. While there were several Sway House members not listed on the lawsuit, I’m only going to only focus on those included names…which were Blake Gr...

If you believe sports supplements (e.g. pre-workout) must be packed to the brim with ingredients, or they shouldn’t be created at all...hopefully you'll have an open mind while consuming this content. In mid-January 2023, Gymshark announced on its social media that it created a branded pre-workout supplement. It would be available only to the UK market and for a limited time only (LTO). Obviou...

What does a YouTube channel (NELK) that gained popularity from outlandish pranks and the supplement industry have to do with one another? NELK (and their lifestyle brand FULL SEND) are riding a trend that’s also fueling massive CPG industry success from the likes of MrBeast (Feastables), Emma Chamberlain (Chamberlain Coffee), and Logan Paul (PRIME Hydration). Everyone thinks the C in CPG stands fo...

A LOT has happened since the parent company of Bang Energy filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on October 10, 2022. If you checked out my previous comprehensive “Bang Energy Bankruptcy Explained” content about five months ago, you’ve likely been wondering what’s going on at the beverage empire that Jack Owoc built. Well…I've been watching everything closely and read most of those 1000+ cour...

What I’ve dubbed the “Bodybuilding.com hot potato game” is basically the best analogy I could create that describes what has happened to the specialty supplement ecommerce website over the last 4ish years.  Bodybuilding.com has been involved in three confirmed mergers and acquisitions transactions since July 2019…with a fourth possibly happening soon. The first was a related-party transaction...

Just like midnight changes everything for Cinderella, MusclePharm did something right before the start of the intellectual property public auction that also changes everything. While MusclePharm being the Cinderella “underdog story” of the sports nutrition industry might be a huge stretch, the company is certainly down on its luck and dreaming of a better life someday. To even have the chance at a...

With the help of PepsiCo, can Celsius Holdings knockout enough competitors in 2023 to reach $1 billion in revenue? This is the first quarter that Celsius energy drinks were integrated into the PepsiCo DSD distribution system after the August deal announcement. Celsius Holdings (NASDAQ: CELH) had quarterly revenue of $178 million, which was up 71% YoY. For the 2022 full-year, the energy drink brand...

Did Optimum Nutrition just join an ultra-exclusive club within the supplement industry? Glanbia Performance Nutrition had 2022 revenue growth of 13.9% YoY on a constant currency basis from strong pricing increases. They also benefitted from the mid-2021 acquisition of LevlUp, a gamer (esports) nutrition brand. Glanbia Performance Nutrition is one of two wholly-owned segments of Glanbia plc (LON:GL...

When making that prediction in November 2022, I never imagined it would come true so quickly, but it’s time to explain what the life after Sharon Leite might look like at The Vitamin Shoppe. Taking over the CEO role at The Vitamin Shoppe will be Lee Wright (or at least he’s filling those shoes right now). I say that because he’s also the Chief Commercial Officer for the parent company Franchise Gr...

Pivotal is an interview-style segment that tackles topics in consumer packaged goods (CPG) and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) from the business leaders that live it EVERY DAY! After years of keeping the industry in suspense, the FDA recently concluded that CBD can’t be regulated under existing frameworks for dietary supplements and foods/beverages. What? Why? Huh? While I read the FDA announcem...

Can you imagine living without peanut butter, sugary treats (e.g. candy or cake), breadcrumbs, or condensed milk? The fact is that these daily CPG staples and many more would likely not exist today if it wasn’t for the innovative minds of Black Americans throughout history. While this is not intended to be a definitive list of historically prominent Black Americans in the CPG industry, it hopefull...

FTC targets one of the biggest supplement brands with a “first of its kind” Amazon case only two months after updating its advertising guidance document for the supplement industry. I tried to warn you in previous content about the FDA and FTC that things would be getting gnarly in for supplement industry stakeholders in 2023! On February 16, 2023, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) took action ag...

Offense and defense are terms that we’re mostly familiar with when talking about sports, but these words are also applicable in business strategy. The easiest way to think about offensive versus defensive business strategy is that when a company is playing offense, its making investments that move the business forward. Alternatively, when a company is playing defense, its making investments to pre...