The Reason Most Nutrition Brands Fail Has Nothing to Do With the Product
Everyone in the consumer packaged goods industry talks about product quality. Clean ingredients. Better formulations. Third party testing. And yes, all of that matters. But the real reason most health and wellness brands fail within their first two years has nothing to do with what is inside the package.
It has everything to do with how the brand gets to market.
Brad Pyatt has launched over 500 products across multiple consumer packaged good companies he founded, including MusclePharm, TRUBAR, and IQ Pouch. He has generated over $1 billion in total revenue. He has sold products in more than 100 countries through 50,000 retail doors. And the single biggest lesson from all of it comes down to one thing.
Product launch strategy determines whether a brand lives or dies.
The Mistake Everyone Makes
New founders in the wellness brands space almost always make the same error. They build a great product, get excited about the packaging, set up a website, run some social media ads, and wait for sales to roll in.
That is not a product launch strategy. That is a hope and pray strategy. And it does not work.
What actually works is understanding the full picture before a single unit ships. Which retail channels make sense for this specific product and consumer. What pricing structure protects margins across each channel. How the promotional calendar aligns with retail partner expectations. And whether the supply chain can actually deliver when orders start coming in.
This is where CPG marketing separates the brands that scale from the brands that stall. It is not about having the loudest voice on Instagram. It is about building operational infrastructure that can support growth without breaking.
What Real Omnichannel Looks Like
When Pyatt built MusclePharm, the brand operated simultaneously through GNC specialty retail, Costco mass retail, and Amazon digital channels. Each channel had different pricing, different packaging requirements, and different promotional strategies. Managing that complexity is something even leading CPG companies with massive teams struggle to execute well.
His omnichannel retail strategy was not about being everywhere for the sake of visibility. It was about being in the right places with the right positioning and the operational backbone to serve each channel profitably.
TRUBAR took a slightly different approach. The brand focused heavily on Target, launching in over 450 stores nationwide while building direct consumer relationships simultaneously. That combination of mass retail credibility and genuine consumer loyalty is exactly what made ETi Gida willing to pay $173 million for the brand in 2026.
The Revenue Side Nobody Wants to Talk About
Here is something that most health and wellness brands founders avoid discussing publicly. Revenue management CPG fundamentals are boring. Trade spend allocation, margin analysis by channel, promotional ROI tracking. None of it is glamorous. None of it makes for good social media content.
But it is the difference between a brand that generates revenue and a brand that generates profit. Pyatt managed a $200 million P&L with $25 million in EBITDA at MusclePharm. Those numbers do not happen by accident. They happen because someone is paying attention to the financial mechanics that most founders ignore.
Among the top consumer packaged goods companies in the world, revenue management is an entire department. For startups and emerging consumer packaged goods brands, it usually falls on the founder. And if that founder does not understand it, the brand will eventually hit a ceiling it cannot break through no matter how good the product is.
The Actual Takeaway
Building a consumer brand in 2024 and beyond is harder than it has ever been. The barrier to creating a product is lower than ever. But the barrier to building a sustainable, profitable business around that product is higher than most people realize.
The founders who win will be the ones who treat CPG marketing as a discipline, not a department. Who build an omnichannel retail strategy before they need one. Who understand that revenue management CPG is not optional. And who develop a product launch strategy based on consumer insight and operational readiness, not just excitement about a new formula.
Brad Pyatt has proven that formula works. Three times. Across three different categories. With over $1 billion in results to show for it.
The playbook exists. Most people just refuse to follow it because the hard parts are not the fun parts.