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Welcome to VITAMIN C®
If you missed the last editions, check them out here.
Read time today: 2:04 min
Hi friend,
It’s Friday morning. You are reading VITAMIN C 🍋- nice choice.
The internet produced ~5 million content pieces on food, innovation and business this week. I ignored almost all of them.
Here are the 5 worth your time:
1. [Science | Report] 📊 It’s all in the data
The FAO published their statistical yearbook again. If you're a food data nerd, you're going to love this.
The report presents statistics about the economic dimensions of agriculture, food security and nutrition, and sustainability in a way that’s eye-catching, interactive, and easy to understand.
Check it out here.
2. [Food for Thought] 👀 When Unilever, Nestlé and Coca-Cola all make the same move, pay attention
The world’s biggest food companies are starting to look more like wellness brands.
Over the last decade, “wellness” was seen as a niche.
Now it’s becoming the blueprint for the next era of consumer growth.
📉 Margins in food are shrinking.
📈 Wellness drives pricing power, loyalty, and culture.
Companies are following the money and that money now lives in functional drinks, metabolic health, and dermatology-grade skin nutrition.
Here’s what the pivot looks like:
Unilever offloaded its $8B ice cream business to double down on beauty and wellness.
Nestlé is reorienting around women’s health, healthy longevity, and GLP-1-friendly nutrition.
Coca-Cola is exploring a Costa Coffee sale to focus on hydration and metabolic performance.
PepsiCo is growing with Gatorade’s expansion into hydration and performance-based drinks, not soda.
Today consumers are shopping for health outcomes: more energy, fewer symptoms, longer life.
L'Oréal’s skincare division posted 9.1% revenue growth last year, while traditional CPG food brands saw single-digit declines.
So as food people we should be asking ourselves: Are we building for food shelves or for future selves?
3. [People & Startups] 💰 Million $$ with free water
This water brand is called FreeWater, and it gives away premium spring water for free. The clever business model behind it is simply genius!
Rather than charging customers for the water, they generate revenue by selling advertising space on their bottles.
Water is a universal need. Advertising is a proven revenue engine. FreeWater connects the two.
Innovation doesn’t always come from new products - sometimes it comes from rethinking who pays.
Check them out here.
4. [Recommendation] 📚
The food system doesn’t need more villains.
It needs more allies.
That’s why the book Collaborating with the Enemy is on my reading list.
In food, it’s easy to point fingers - farmers, companies, retailers, consumers. Everyone has someone to blaim. And progress stalls.
I haven’t read the book but I love the premise: Real change doesn’t happen in echo chambers. It happens when opposing interests stay in the room long enough to move something.
For food professionals working on complex, interconnected challenges, that idea feels especially timely.
So maybe next week, go say hi to someone you’ve been avoiding.
Worst case? An awkward coffee. Best case? Progress.
5. [Inspiration] ✨
In food, we talk a lot about resilience.
This might be where it actually starts:
Having fun -> doing it more
Doing it more -> getting better
Getting better -> winning/ creating impact
Stay awesome,
Lia
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