Chinese consumers’ demand for nutrition continues to expand, and there is still great potential for development. Increased health awareness and consumption power have driven the rapid development of China’s nutritional products industry, which is expected to reach CNY 355.4 billion in 2024.
China’s maternity and baby nutrition market maintains high growth. Among all types of maternity and baby products, maternity and baby nutrition products have the fastest growth, with year-on-year growth rates of 52% and 9.8%.
1. Market trends of imported nutrition in China
Maternity and baby nutritional supplements are currently the fastest growing sector in the entire maternity and baby market. Maternity and baby nutritional supplements can supplement nutrition for mothers who are expecting and pregnant, as well as mothers and babys in the early parenting stage (for babys and young children aged 0 to 6 years old).
According to the analysis of maternity and baby food purchase decision-making factors, “safety” is one of the most important decision-making factors for mothers when purchasing products. Due to the frequent food problems in China in recent years, mom consumers lack trust in Chinese brands and are more willing to choose imported foreign brands. Overseas nutrition brands will become a new trend in the development of the nutrition category.
Preference for domestic brands has increased, but overseas brands will still dominate in the future.
In recent years, Chinese brands have developed rapidly. However, in the future, China’s maternity and baby nutrition market will still be dominated by overseas brands, and they will use their huge product advantages to gradually deepen their brand status . In the 2022 Tmall’s Double Eleven’s activity of maternity and baby nutrition products ,the top 10 sales are all overseas brands/products.
Top 10 sales of maternity and baby nutrition brands on Tmall Double Eleven in 2022
| Brand | Origin | |
| Top 1 | INNE | German |
| Top 2 | Bio island | Australia |
| Top 3 | Eric Favre | France |
| Top 4 | Nemans | USA |
| Top 5 | Childlife | USA |
| Top 6 | Nature’s Way | Australia |
| Top 7 | BIOSTIME | France |
| Top 8 | Swisse | Australia |
| Top 9 | Ddrops | Canada |
| Top 10 | Witsbb | Australia |
2. Consumer preferences in nutrition industry
Pregnant mothers pay attention to balanced nutrition and are highly receptive to various maternity and baby nutritional products. When choosing a supplement of multiple types of key nutrients, mineral supplements are the most accepted nutritional supplements for pregnant mothers, followed by vitamins and other nutritional supplements, such as DHA, dietary fiber, etc.
Pregnant mothers have a good command of maternity and baby nutrition products and have extensive channels for obtaining information.
More than 90% of pregnant and postpartum people have a certain level of knowledge about maternity and baby nutrition products, and prefer online channels to obtain information, such as maternity and baby-related APPs/websites, social media, content communities, e-commerce platforms, and short videos. The proportion of platform understanding is above 50%.
3. New demands of consumers: safety upgrades, formula innovation, form breakthroughs
From the perspective of new consumption trends, maternity and baby consumers pay great attention to safety needs when purchasing nutritional products. This kind of “safety” must not only be certified and endorsed by authoritative standards, but also supported by clear ingredient data. For example, “core nutritional element content” is the focus of consumers’ attention. After meeting the basic nutritional supplement needs, the maternity and baby population has put forward higher requirements for the raw material formula of products. 42.9% of the respondents hope that there will be no additional additives in the formula, 34.7% hope that the product functions will be strengthened, 32.7% hope that the packaging design will be more portable, and 28.6% hope that the taste will be better. In addition, personalized customization, low calories, good appearance, etc. are also the expectations of the maternity and baby population for nutritional product innovation.
| maternity expo 2024 baby nutrition seminars[1] |
| CBME 2024 baby nutrition and health[2] |
| CBME 2024 maternity and baby product awards[3] |
