PANADOL EXTENDED WITH NATURAL PAIN RELIEF

AUSTRALIA: Using plant-based active ingredients, Haleon’s PanaNatra tablets and soft capsules — now available in Australia – have been created to ease and manage mild muscle, joint and general pain. The line-up has three options, featuring patented ingredients to elevate the brand’s scientific credentials: 

• PanaNatra Joint Pain Relief, formulated with Curcumin C3 Complex (a patented curcumin combination), Apresflex (a blend of boswellia extract enriched with boswellia oil & boswellic acid) and Bioperine (a unique blend of piperine that boosts absorption of curcumin)

• PanaNatra Muscle Pain Relief with Rhuleave-K, a combination of curcuminoids and boswellia 

• PanaNatra Sleep & Pain Relief (Ashwagandha KSM-66) 

Nicholas Hall Writes: My colleague Fiona Cooper, a staff writer at Insight Asia-Pacific, reminds me that investment in naturals was listed as part of Haleon’s growth strategy in its spin-off prospectus in mid-2022. While still in its early days as an independent company, as well as being the leading player in consumer health, Haleon has pioneered bridging the medicated and non-medicated gap with line extensions to its famous brands. Recent rollouts include PanaNatural Cough Syrup in UAE, Excedrin Head Care (to support “head health”) in USA, and VoltaNatura (topical analgesic) and FeniNatural (anti-itch) in markets across Europe. The latest launch brings natural options to Panadol, Australia’s No.1 systemic analgesic, by filling the maintenance and prevention gap that remains largely unaddressed within the category. 

Meanwhile, regulatory changes — discussions by the TGA to reduce paracetamol pack sizes, and the upscheduling of modified-release paracetamol in 2020 — make diversification an attractive option locally. These are important developments for Haleon in Australia, the analgesics category and the global consumer healthcare market. In fact, natural, organic and even vegan products are at the cutting edge of our industry.

The CHC industry is truly at a crossroads, with a great deal of uncertainty expected in the years ahead. That uncertainty extends to regulatory, and industry associations around the world keep a watchful eye open to make sure that our best interests are defended at a time when regulators want to erect even higher barriers to prevent side-effects, and in doing so discourage innovation. In that context, I’d like to give a shout-out to the work of the Global Self-Care Federation and its new Chair, Manoj Raghunandanan, and Director-General Judy Stenmark. Here at Nicholas Hall Group, we are highly supportive of the work of GSCF and for several years have sponsored their two interns. Keep up the good work!

Now is your last chance to save up to GB£1,350 when you pre-order the 2023 edition of our Innovation in CHC report, publishing this week! Drawn from CHC New Products Tracker, this report explores the rise of naturals and innovation by marketer, region and country. It showcases 10 major ingredient trends, 5 delivery format trends and 100 key innovations from 2022. For more information, or to pre-order your copy with the pre-publication discount, contact melissa.lee@NicholasHall.com.

Alli granted final marketing approval in Japan

Following the recommendation of orlistat for direct-to-OTC approval in Japan, anti-obesity drug Alli has been granted final marketing approval by the Ministry of Health, Labour & Welfare. Taisho, which gained the rights to develop and market orlistat in Japan from GSK in 2009, is yet to announce the product’s release date.

Victoria Blake, head of Competitive Intelligence & Market Analysis (CIMA), writes: The World Health Organisation reports that worldwide obesity has almost tripled since 1975 – in 2016, almost 2bn adults were overweight. However, a report in 2020 found that across 7 major markets (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, UK, Japan and USA), Japan had the lowest total prevalence of obesity at 4%. While orlistat is a welcome innovation to the self-care market as a scientifically-proven solution to weight loss, it is notable that the target audience appears to be significantly smaller than in some Western markets (prevalence was reported at 40% for the USA). Nevertheless, serious government concerns regarding the economic healthcare impact of obesity in Japan’s older population led to the Metabo Law in 2008, which attempts to address obesity concerns through regular monitoring of waist size in those aged 40-74 years. Alli was switched in the USA in 2007 and in the EU in 2009 (the first drug to go through the EU Centralised procedure). Lack of repeat purchases was a key factor behind limited growth for the brand, consumers prone to expecting “miracle cures” and rapid results when it comes to weight loss vs faith in longer-term, proven regimen. We watch with interest to see how Taisho’s strategy unfolds for orlistat in this new market.

Nicholas Hall Writes: I wanted to lead with this story this week, not because Alli is a wonder brand – sadly, it failed in the consumer market – but because of the huge unmet demand for effective weight loss products, which is rightly pointed out by my colleague Victoria Blake. In fact, there is no other sector in consumer health where demand is so high and delivery so poor. In all other sectors we have great products and the job is communicating their benefits to consumers. This is the exact reverse, where demand is almost unlimited among an increasingly overweight population, but where we just don’t have safe and effective products in consumer health or indeed in the prescription market. So no one who reads this column will be surprised that weight loss and obesity is to be a major topic covered in my signature report, New Paradigms 2023 – the Future Resumed. 

One of the problems that Alli faced was honesty. The brand was marketed in terms of delivering major benefits, but those benefits could only be achieved if consumers modified their lifestyle as well. This they were largely unwilling to do, and there is a great deal of anecdotal evidence that consumers taking a weight loss product feel empowered to consume more of their favourite foods and drinks, even though contrary to the necessary changes that enable it to be effective. And, of course, weight loss brands stress simplicity, not the complex set of lifestyle changes necessary to deliver benefits.

We are delighted to announce that Nicholas will explore “The Future Resumed” in the upcoming 2023 edition of his signature New Paradigms report! Offering insights into unmet consumer needs, demographic drivers, emerging markets and more, this report will provide an essential strategic review of key factors impacting the CHC industry. To pre-order your copy at a discounted rate, or for more information, please contact melissa.lee@NicholasHall.com.

e-Commerce Ascential for GSK Consumer

UK-based Ascential Digital Commerce and GSK Consumer Healthcare (soon to become Haleon) will next week launch Ascential Digital Commerce Connect at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. The data-rich digital commerce platform provides clarity about GSK CH e-Commerce brand performance and improves reaction time to market dynamics in the rapidly growing e-Commerce market. The Connect platform analyses, visualises and displays marketing data about each brand and competitor to monitor key activities and answer marketers’ key questions when it comes to:

• Understanding the current brand / sales performance in the e-Commerce marketplace – standalone vs key competitors and owned channels vs major online retailers like Amazon and Alibaba
• Dissecting what brand health looks like regionally throughout EMEA, USA / N America, Asia-Pacific & Latin America
• Navigating potential challenges and outages around supply chain, R&D, disruptive markets and other key metrics
• More accurately calculating marketing spending as a percentage of gross revenue

GSK CH expects that e-Commerce growth will reach the mid-teens percentage of the business by 2025, making it a priority channel to drive overall sales.

Nicholas Hall’s Touchpoints: Duncan Painter, the CEO of Ascential, is right when he says: “The next five years represent a tipping point in the retail industry. Retailers and brands with the deepest, most recent insights into the digital performance of their products and services will gain an informed, competitive edge.” There is an insatiable demand for e-Commerce data in the consumer healthcare market, and I’ve just signed off on a very substantial budget – at least by our standards – to buy in and provide improved e-Comms data to our client base, which I am very pleased to say for the first time ever now includes all six of the top CHC players.

e-Commerce accounted for 14% of all CHC sales in 2021 and this share is forecast to exactly double in the next decade, with a higher achievement in Asia, especially China. Some analysts are even more bullish – one we’ve looked at and rejected put e-Comms so high that the only outcome would be the complete collapse of the store retailer sector, and surely that is not going to happen! Indeed, we hear numerous reports of a revival of consumer interest in the physical shopping experience. Nevertheless, e-Commerce is part of the Future Resumed, as we now call the New Paradigm for CHC, but in a subtle omni-mix of physical and digital shopping that offers the maximum flexibility and choice to consumers wishing to self-medicate.

Stay tuned for the first edition of the agenda for our Asia-Pacific e-Conference, to be hosted by Nicholas and the team on 23 November! As well as exploring expanding possibilities in CHC within the region, this event will also include the presentation of our Regional CHC Creative Marketing Award. For more information, or to register, please contact elizabeth.bernos@NicholasHall.com.