The Road

“The road to Hell is paved with good intentions”. Peoples' attitude to their health can be like that. The gym, the regular workout, diet, the rowing machine, etc.......... taking vitamins, minerals, powders and shakes can also be like that . Put your hand up if you ever started taking them but gave up after a short time. The stuff is probably still on your shelf right?

Basically there are two issues here. The first is-why do people invest a lot of money in their health by buying what is known as food supplements, and secondly – for goodness sakes! Why don't people use what they paid for?

Food Supplements

We take supplements because we need to supplement the food that we eat. In todays modern world the nutritional value of food is not what it used to be and food, just like humans gets stressed out .

Doctors and diet experts recommend we eat at least five portions of red and green vegetables every day plus milk, meat and poultry products (a cheeseburger with fries and a side salad washed down with a milk shake doesn't count!). But who does this? Or more to the point who does this on a regular basis? The answer is that most people don't.

And think about this piece of good news. Meat and poultry is now mass produced and full of hormones and antibiotics – as is fish. Sure it helps grow them big and healthy before they get to the table but do we really want to be eating that?

Industry, modern fertilizers in farming and the rivers all bring pollution, the air we breathe – the list goes on.

Take fruit. Think about it! You can now get any fruit you want throughout the year. What happened to seasons? When were they cancelled? when producers realized that they could pick fruit before it was ripe and store it. Then after shipping it around the world the fruit could be artificially ripened or it would ripen by itself by the time it got to where it was going.

This makes good economic sense but at great expense for the fruit. The normal ripening process (when the nutritional value of the fruit is maximized and which only takes place on the tree) is missing – so you may be eating something that looks great but frankly tastes ##@@%**! with poor nutritional content.

So now, more and more people (remember the baby boomers) are realizing that yes, you obviously do get nutrition from food but not like the good old days and that if they want to stay healthy they had better do something about it, and this means supplementing their diet with what is missing.

How? Let's consider the main ways you can get your supplements. And then we will understand the second part of the equation – why people start taking supplements but then give up.

What do we have?

1. Pills

2. Powders

3. Liquids

PILLS

Pills have been around for thousands of years (ancient Egyptians used them) and by and large havn't changed that much. Take your active ingredient, something to bulk it (chalk), a binding agent and then compress it all up to 20,000 PSI (pounds per square inch). Give it a coating and a nice color and there you have it. Well, not quite. Studies show that a lot of the active ingredient may not get absorbed because the tablet is too hard to dissolve properly in your stomach and by the time it has passed through your system it is too late. This also explains why vitamin pills are sooooo big. They have to be because in order to get the basic levels of absorption you need to start off with mega doses, most of which passes right through you.

So who wants to take a giant rock hard lump that has to be chocked down, is hard to break and quite often smells terrible? – keep horse pills for horses. There must be an alternative.

POWDERS

Great idea – wrong!

Powders need to be kept dry but even so a lot of the time you open up the container and this solid looking lump looks back at you. OK, you bash it to death and turn it into powder again. You then have to measure it, add water and shake until all the powder dissolves. Then you have to drink it which can be a challenge in itself. The answer therefore must be liquids.

LIQUIDS

Is the the answer? Well not really. The stuff needs to be kept in the fridge and you still need to measure the amount you take every day. Also, quite often the liquid is actually a suspension which must be shaken hard to make sure that everything mixes properly. Not so simple!

So there we have it. We can understand why people want and need food supplements. And we can also understand why so many people start and then don't bother continuing.

Now here's the really interesting bit. The Wellness industry keeps growing and growing which means more and more people are using products, starting and not finishing them and moving from one option to another.

So what is the answer that is going to help fuel this giant of an industry?

The answer is so simple – and like all simple things you wonder “why didn't I think of that”.

The next post will examine the simple solution and start to look at the ways of marketing in the Wellness industry.

Long live the baby boomers!

The trend now making waves is Health -ours! In the good old days, you lived and then died! more often than not, at a young age. Go back 100 years and with an average life expectancy of 45-50 years , people tended to die of acute illnesses and infectious diseases.
Today this is not so. Average life expectancy is in the range of 75-82 years and most people don't die of the “old killers” and acute illnesses, so progress has been made - but at a price.
Today's problems are chronic diseases which affect the quality of life. So, what do you want? Quantity or quality? - well, why can't you have both? And with this simple question, the Health trend was born.
After WW2, along came the baby boomers. They brought new fads and ideas and changed society, moving in paradigm shifts with respect to how they shaped the world (this is a different topic and will be discussed later – if you don't know what a paradigm shift is, Google it!).
As the decades rolled on, so did the baby boomers. The guys at Woodstock still like to “get on down” and play the air guitar, it's just that they're a bit more careful doing it 'cos their back ain't what it used to be!
Basically, any one from the fifties and sixties can be defined as a baby boomer and with age comes more disposable income and a desire to enjoy life. To be able to do things – active holidays, sport even taking life at a slow pace but being physically and mentally able to enjoy it, and all of this demands health.
For the first time in history, man is now beating illness and living to an age once thought impossible for most people. Today, people “assume” that they will live into their 80's and more, and plan accordingly.
So, millions and millions of baby boomers are now investing in their health, and giving rise to a industry that is not multimillion or even multibillion, but is already a multitrillion dollar industry (I am not talking about sports equipment etc. but only the products people take on a daily basis to improve their health).
This vast economic powerhouse has people taking pills, potions, shakes, injections and all kinds of things as a way of maintaining a healthy centre line. This is good and as an integral part of a good lifestyle probably means you'll come out on top (though you might want to cut back on the hamburgers and cigarettes at the same time).
By the way, although the impetus for this industry is the babyboomers, more and more young people are now much more “health aware” and are plugged in as well.
Now, trends come and trends go, after all that is what a trend is. There is always the next thing. This trend however is different. It is not a new way of doing something, a different machine that everyone must have for a few years etc. No, this directly affects who and what we are and as such, will grow as young people “come of age” and fuel the Health trend from below whilst at the same time babyboomers carry on and expand the trend from the front.
In fact, within the next five to ten years, the Health trend will cease to exist as a trend as it becomes the norm and a rouine part of our lives – yours and mine.
So what does it mean for us? Why do people take on a daily basis, vitamins, minerals, diet products, and a whole host of herbs and exotic products.
Why can't we all just eat and live a more healthy life style? Wouldn't that solve the problem? Probably but it is harder than you think and even if you want to, not always easy to carry out.
The next post will look a bit more closely about the concept of keeping healthy and why billions of dollars are wasted each year by the very people who want to stay healthy.

Health

What exactly does Health mean? or to put it another way. If I am healthy then I am not ill. This could be bad news, really bad news for some people or to be more exact, the pharmaceutical industry.
When I am "ill" I take medication and I get better. Now, due to the fact that the pharmaceutical industry is based on the profit motive (I also like to make money), and that they make the medications that people sniff, swallow, rub on, inject and..........! then the implication is that they have every interest in lots of people being ill ("not well" sounds nicer) SO THAT THEY WILL USE THEIR PRODUCTS. This of course is the name of the game and I do not blame them. There are of course lots of extremely important life saving drugs and the industry as a whole is to be thanked for that. However, think what would happen if people were always well. What would happen to the vast majority of the medications that we use (genuine life saving treatments notwithstanding)? They could be consigned to the scrap heap.


The "Health" industry - which needs lots of "not well" people to survive and stay healthy itself would be in trouble.


In such a situation we would be heading to a different concept or an emerging trend. Namely an industry that is devoted not to curing ill people, but maintaining peoples Wellness. Or in other words. The Wellness industry.


The good news is that the Wellness industry is already here and is growing.



If you have any thoughts or comments, share them with me.

Trends

The last post talked about dreams and left off with the question “why don't most people break the mold?”
The answer is actually quite simple. If you break the mold then where is the framework? What is going to keep you secure? What will happen to the comfort zone? Or the real big one. What will people think?
These are all valid issues and there is nothing wrong in asking such questions however, they simply slow you down and when something or someone slows down - it loses momentum.
Once the momentum is lost then it is very difficult to progress from just talking to doing.
Progress, be it individual or collective is what keeps the world going round so lets examine progress which can certainly be measured in terms of trends.
Trends can come in all sorts of packages; social, political, commercial etc. Some trends are merely an issue of fashion and can disappear almost as quickly as they come. Others however, make a lasting impact and have the power to affect future generations.
The trend we will focus on is Health (goes with Wealth) and there are good reasons for this.
Stay tuned in and if you havn't yet bookmarked my blog then do so now.

Dreams

''Take the attitude of a student, never be too big to ask questions, never know too much to learn something new'' – (Og Mandino 1923-1996).


People will tell you that they are “happy” with their lives. Why? Because it's true and within a normal frame of day to day reference - it's the easy answer and people naturally think of their families and relationships - which is great.
However, if asked if they are “happy “with their lives as they live it now - then the answer can be more complex – just ask them “what do you want”? and we get into the area of people's dreams for the future (early retirement - the round the world trip, backpacking, new car, the new house, helping the kids when they get married, having financial freedom etc.). These dreams however, stay as just that for most people and when they get around to “doing something” it's too late.Why? Good question! I am not Freud but it does mean that most people will just stay “happy” with their lives. The fact is that the majority of people are comfortable being in a “zone of happy discomfort”. They look around, and seeing their peers in a similar situation makes them feel secure - “see, it's not just me”.
When they look in the mirror they can tell themselves “Yes. I am working on my dreams and aspirations but right now I am busy so I'll act on it tomorrow”. People like to live with their dreams (they can have them for years like old friend) and then over the years look back and think “if only”.... It's so easy to go down this road and dosn't threaten anyone.
On the other hand, how many people know of someone from the same background and situation who actually broke the mold and LIVED his or her dreams NOW and did not wait until it was too late. That person makes for a great story to talk about but hey, “they were different”.
So why don't most people break the mold? - this will be discussed in the next posting.
I welcome feedback and comments. You can also look me up in Twitter (search for Allan Younger)