In 2019, the Australian vitamin and supplement market was valued at $5 billion. The Covid-19 pandemic has fast-tracked consumer demand for wellness ingestibles and Grand View Review, the US based market researcher, predicts that the global dietary supplements market will reach US$230 billion by 2027.
Larah Loutati and Ilyas Anane launched Vitable in March 2019 to tap into the growing demand for health and well-being products. Instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, the entrepreneurs’ main point of difference was personalised packs sold directly to consumers.
Loutati was formerly a senior executive with HelloFresh, the Germany-based meal kit company which is the market leader in the US and operates in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Scandinavia and Western Europe. Anane also has strong tech experience with Rocket Internet, the German venture capital company, which strongly supported fashion retailer, The Iconic.
Rocket internet also injected funds into Vitable in early 2019 during its initial growth phase. Other seed investors included BWX, the owner of Sukin skincare, through its BWX Tomorrow Fund. Dave Fenlon, Group CEO of BWX Brands, and Oliver Samwer, CEO of Rocket Internet, are both members of Vitable’s Board of Advisors.
Vitable up-ended the usual off-the-shelf MO of the vitamins and supplements market and has expanded to New Zealand and Singapore. The company helps customers to create a personalised vitamin and health supplement regimen through an online questionnaire and algorithms.
Vitable’s formulas and supplements are made in Australia. In 2020, more than 250,000 consumers completed the company’s questionnaire to receive individualised vitamins and supplements. Another plus point of the monthly subscription service is that products can be customised further if health needs change.
The company has raised an extra $5.5 million in Series A funding to fuel Vitable’s further expansion in the Asia/Pacific region. One of the major new investors is Brenteca Investments, a fund founded by Ben McHarg of the Life-Space Group, whose portfolio includes Australia’s number one probiotics brand and Pentavite, the children’s supplement brand. Artesian, the venture capital company, and Clifford Rosenberg, the former managing director of LinkedIn ANZ, have also invested in the fast-growing company.