You Won’t Believe Your Eyes: Children’s Supplements Find New Formats

Discovered in the 1910’s, vitamine, a term coined by Polish scientist Casimir Funk, led slowly to what we know today as Vitamins, though it's unlikely Funk would recognize the brightly colored, candy coated varieties targeted towards parents to give their kids. 

Even the earliest adult multivitamin, introduced in the early 1940’s, was much more medicinal than fan favorite Flintstones, introduced in 1968 as one of the earliest to capitalize on the childrens market. Eventually, manufacturers swapped the chalky candy like format for chewable gummy vitamins, which became so popular among kids that even the adults started taking them.  

It’s estimated that today, at least ⅓ of U.S. children take at least one vitamin daily, a fast growing section of the $140 billion Dietary Supplements industry.  Specifically in the pediatrics segment of this market, recent years have seen a shift from pills and gummies to powders and liquids. Much of this is related to backlash against added sugars, concerns over tooth decay and claims of greater absorption for the emergent formats. 

As the category continues to grow, today’s parents realize that while supplements can help fill nutritional gaps, giving kids a daily dose of added sugar somewhat defeats the purpose.  For the next generation, it’s not enough to simply “take your vitamins,” but rather to know what’s in them, and where they came from.