Vitamin shoppers spend more across HBA

According to analysis by Pharmavite, vitamin-buying households spend more than other category buyers across the health and beauty department with regard to average dollars spent per item per occasion. Vitamin buyers spend $14.95 per item per occasion, versus $14.54 for the next highest category (women’s fragrance) and $12.11 for shoppers buying diet aids.


Vitamin buyers also represent a larger prescription opportunity. The average vitamin buyer spends $579 annually on prescriptions, versus $533 for purchasers of analgesics and $493 for purchasers of allergy and cold medicines. 


Vitamin and supplement sales were up by 3.5% to $3.6 billion for the 52 weeks ended Feb. 19 across food, drug and mass (excluding Walmart), according to scan data provided by SymphonyIRI Group. Across single-ingredient supplements, essential fatty acid sales have surpassed sales of the previous big fish in the supplement category — glucosamine and chondroitin. For that 52-week period, essential fatty acid sales totaled $347.2 million (up 5.3%) versus glucosamine and chondroitin sales of $286.4 million (down 6.4%). An up-and-coming product category is probiotics, sales of which were up 21% to $161.5 million for the period.