{"id":18962,"date":"2020-08-18T20:39:25","date_gmt":"2020-08-18T20:39:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/?p=18962"},"modified":"2022-01-16T07:18:09","modified_gmt":"2022-01-16T07:18:09","slug":"how-has-covid-impacted-the-sports-supplement-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/blog\/how-has-covid-impacted-the-sports-supplement-industry\/","title":{"rendered":"How Has COVID Impacted the Sports Supplement Industry?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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In\nour current COVID-19 world, we have had to adjust to a new way of doing things.\nWe minimize our exposure by making fewer trips to the grocery store, if we go\nat all, and our new fitness center is the living room, or the park. Thankfully\nwe still have a few more months to take advantage of the nice weather, but cold\nand flu season is on the way, leading many to wonder how they will continue to\nstay strong and healthy \u2013 inside and out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Link Between Sports Supplements and COVID\/Immune Support <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

One very promising area of interest is in\nutilizing current sports nutrition supplements to support immune health. For\nexample, researchers have found that carnosine\nreduced acute lung injury caused by H9N2 swine flu<\/a>. One easy and affordable way to increase levels of\ncarnosine in the body is by consuming beta-alanine \u2013 an ingredient commonly\nused in sports supplement formulations. In sports nutrition, beta-alanine is\nincluded to help enhance muscular endurance, prolonging time to fatigue and\nimproving athletic performance. Other ingredients that are being looked at for\ntheir immune benefits and are also widely available in dietary sports\nsupplements are glucosamine, chondroitin, creatine, curcumin, phytochemicals\nand bioflavonoids. These ingredients offer anti-inflammatory and antioxidant\nproperties that are helpful in preventing illness and reducing inflammation and\ninjury.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consumers Not Traveling or Exercising in Public Places<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

As a result of travel restrictions and people not exercising in shared spaces, the need for portable or on-the-go supplement options such as bars, RTDs (Ready-To-Drink) and stick packs is temporarily on hold. This will likely be the case for some time, because the rules will continue to require social distancing and because our behaviors and attitudes about what is “necessary” have changed. Our going-out choices, along with our purchasing choices, have been, most likely permanently altered. This shift in consumer priority and need will require private label supplement manufacturers like NutraCap Labs to provide innovation in that goes beyond the functionality of convenient packaging and addresses the concern for immunity and recovery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Future of Sports Supplements –\nInnovation<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The\ndietary supplement industry is ever evolving, and that is especially true of\nthe sports nutrition category. There will always be a push for new and exciting\nproducts. So where will that innovation come from? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Packaging:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\nhas been a continuous and increasing demand over the past several years for\nsports supplements and other private label supplements to be convenient for the\nactive, on-the-go consumer. Daily packs, bars, and beverages that can go from\nthe gym bag to the car to the hotel have been popular among consumers. (We\nhadn’t quite topped the wave and come down the other side yet of all of the\nwaste these smaller packages create \u2013 but that’s a different post.) These types\nof packages are poorly positioned for the needs of today’s consumer, who is far\nless likely to be using these products outside of the home. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As\na result, there will be a growing shift towards more economic packages offering\nvalue, recyclability, and sustainability. (Pro tip: These larger packages allow\nfor a lot more outer surface area to talk about the additional benefits of\nthese products!)  This trend is so\nprevalent that it even extends to consumers wanting vegan capsules due to\nenvironmental concerns.  Sustainability\nis shifting from a “nice to have” to a “need to have” for\nmany consumers and companies in the in the sports supplements industry, tying\nin with key values in caring about health and the environment. Keep an eye on sustainable\npackaging trends in the future as it\u2019s likely we will see more practical and\neconomic options in the not too distant future. \nFrom the use of bio-based materials to recycle-friendly shrink-film,\noptions exist to make your finished private label supplement fully recyclable. These\ntypes of packages will continue to gain in popularity, and are what you want to\nbe exploring for your product line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ingredients:<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Athletes\nand fitness enthusiasts are remarkably resilient and their ability to adapt to\nthe current pandemic is no different.  They\nknow that the best way to stay healthy amidst this pandemic is to “just\nkeep swimming<\/em>” \u2013 or running, or lifting, or yoga\u2019ing. They also\nunderstand the benefits of good nutrition, and the impact that has on their\nperformance and overall health. These consumers have continued to use their\ntrusted supplements for endurance, muscle recovery and strength, but we\u2019re\nstarting to see a shift in focus to a different kind of strength that will help\nto prevent them from getting sick.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\naddition to the beta-alanine we mentioned above, there are other tried-and-true\nsports ingredients that are also powerhouses for immune support \u2013 most people\njust don’t know about them yet:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Creatine<\/em><\/strong> is a popular organic acid that is commonly used in sports\nsupplements by bodybuilders and athletes. A new study<\/a> has found\nthat creatine provides vital support to the immune cells to better fight\ncancer. Creatine uptake is vital to the anti-tumor activities of CD8 T cells<\/a>, (also\ncalled killer T cells),  which are the\nimmune cells tasked with finding and destroying the infected cells.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BCAAs<\/em><\/strong> are another extremely popular sports supplement. Daily intake of BCAA has been shown to improve the immune response<\/a> among athletes\nundergoing endurance training. Additionally, BCAAs can be used by immune cells\nwithin the gut as a fuel source, which allows the immune system to regenerate itself\nmore efficiently and protect against harmful pathogens. In short, BCAA can aid\nin the building of a strong immune system, which aids in recovery<\/a> and makes you less likely to get sick. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These\nestablished sports ingredients and many more are being studied by leading\nresearchers all over the world, who continue to identify their abilities to\nprovide immune support. In the meantime, they offer great opportunities for\nsports supplement brands to highlight the dual-benefit of both sports\nperformance and immunity.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tell us how your use of sports\nsupplements has changed as a result of COVID?<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In our current COVID-19 world, we have had to adjust to a new way of doing things. We minimize our exposure by making fewer trips to the grocery store, if we go at all, and our new fitness center is the living room, or the park. Thankfully we still have a few more months to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18962"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18962"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20091,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18962\/revisions\/20091"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutracapusa.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}