Health & wellness consumers are known for their passion for products they want and the ways in which those products are sourced, made, and packaged.
Our recent 2022 Holiday Shopper Study uncovered attitudes that consumers have when shopping for health & wellness gifts.
We explored what makes health & wellness consumers buy for others? Here’s what we discovered:
- 63% want value
- 48% expect the “best” ingredients
- 43% consider “clean” ingredients
- 24% look for sustainable packaging
Below, we explore these key findings further.
63% of consumers will shop for excellence when buying a health & wellness gift.
What does “value” mean?
In a 2016 study published in Harvard Business Review, Bain & Company discovered that the concept of value consists of 30 different elements. It also breaks down the five most important parts of “value” in 10 different industries. While each industry has a different list, the #1 element is consistent across the board: Quality.
Bain asserts that perceived quality is more important to a purchasing decision than actual quality. In other words, a valuable way to appeal to holiday shoppers looking for gifts in the health & wellness vertical is to showcase its quality.
Design, packaging, and claims can all play into this concept.
Beyond value, other elements of the product health & wellness shoppers consider.
48% of consumers say they look for health & wellness gifts that use the “best” ingredients.
“Best” is a subjective term that can vary tremendously from consumer to consumer.
The Greater Goods points out that high-quality ingredients often include concepts like freshness, locality, and minimal processing in terms of food.
For beauty, these perceptions are different. “Best ingredients” may include specific names, like hyaluronic acid or ceramides, as listed by Dr. Amy Zaoshi Yuan of Proven Skincare.
Beyond that, the concept of best ingredients can extend to any part of the health & wellness vertical, perhaps even to the cleaning solutions that someone wants to use on fitness equipment or the composition of a pre-workout mix.
Because “best” is a variable concept, it’s important for brands to consider the perceptions of their own products or services in the context of what they do and what goes into it. This is especially important to consider when trying to drive holiday sales.
43% say that “clean” ingredients are important when buying a health & wellness gift.
According to the International Food Information Council, consumers pay attention to ingredients far more than in previous years including:
- Looking at ingredient names to identify those that sound “clean” and those that sound like chemicals.
- Qualities like “not artificial or synthetic,” “organic,” and “fresh” contributed to a consumer’s impression of the “cleanliness” of ingredients.
As a result, the impression of “clean” ingredients comes from a variety of informational sources, including a product’s label and a consumer’s own knowledge (or even impression) of what different ingredients may mean.
The concept of “clean beauty” is also gaining momentum among consumers, as Harper’s Bazaar discusses. In this context, cleanliness can refer to organic ingredients or even cruelty-free business practices, such as not testing products on animals.
While different categories may observe the concept of “clean” ingredients differently, they all share two major commonalities.
- Consumers perceive “organic” ingredients to be cleaner than GMOs.
- Consumers also tend to avoid ingredient names that sound like chemical compounds, as opposed to naturally-grown ingredient names.
These are two promising qualities that can help a holiday shopper feel confident in purchasing a gift this year.
24% of consumers say that they look for sustainable packaging.
Sustainable packaging has been a priority for numerous health & wellness brands over the past few years, and its popularity has been growing over time. Brands are continuously introducing more environmentally-friendly initiatives for their business, and consumers are responding this holiday season. A quarter of consumers are prioritizing sustainable packaging when it comes to health & wellness holiday shopping.
Creating a packaging solution from recyclable or biodegradable materials may be enough to show consumers that a brand is conscious of its impact on the world at large, or it could be a starting point to become an industry leader in sustainable packaging within the health & wellness vertical.
Either way, brands can use this idea to tip the scales in their favor and perhaps even stand out on a crowded shelf when appealing to holiday shoppers.
Don’t miss all of the holiday shopping insights from our quantitative study. Download the full, free report to share with your team.