Gummies maintain strong growth

The gummy sub-segment within overall vitamins is not only still growing substantially, the dollar volume of that alternative delivery format has reached nowhere near its ceiling of potential, at least not yet. Overall, sales of vitamins for the 52 weeks ended Dec. 28, 2014, were up 0.4% to $6.5 billion across total U.S. multi-outlets, according to IRI.

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Relatively flat sales is just not the story with gummies — they’re still on a strong growth projectory. “The actual gummy segment is up like 9% to 10%,” Jim Craigie, Church & Dwight chairman and CEO, told analysts earlier in May, referencing more recent sales trends. “That’s really encouraging news. That’s why we bought into this business — because the gummies was the fastest-growing piece of the business,” he said.



C&D has almost completed construction of its new gummy vitamin manufacturing facility in York, Pa. “This significant $60 million investment is expected to expand our production capacity by 75%,” Craigie said. “We believe the future prospects of the gummy vitamin category are strong as more adults switch from traditional vitamin pills to gummy vitamins, as evidenced by the continued double-digit growth of the category.”



But C&D isn’t the only one gaming for gummies. Perrigo and Ferrara Candy Co. announced in January a five-year deal to manufacture store-brand gummy vitamins and dietary supplements to seize this trend opportunity. Citing IRI multi-outlet data, sales of just vitamin and dietary supplement gummies are forecasted to reach $1 billion by 2017, Perrigo reported.