Hydration powders, stress gummies and hair supplements may not scream ‘behemoth growth driver’, but they’re powering Unilever’s biggest growth engine. Thursday, the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) conglomerate’s beauty and well-being division posted 3.7 per cent underlying sales growth in the first half of 2025 to €6.5 billion, outpacing the wider group. Leading the charge, wellness, which Unilever classifies as well-being, delivered double-digit growth for the 21st straight quarter.
“Well-being has worked for us because of two things,” says Jostein Solheim, Unilever’s well-being CEO, speaking to Vogue Business over Zoom from the company’s London offices, just hours after stepping off a red-eye flight from New York. “There’s been some luck on timing, [given consumers’ keen interest in their health, an accelerating wellness market and acquisition opportunities], but we’ve also committed to a ‘go narrow, go deep’ brand strategy.”
One of five business groups within Unilever, the well-being vertical was launched seven years ago as part of its wider beauty and wellness division. It comprises wellness brands: the largest being hydration-focused Liquid IV, supplement brand Olly and hair health specialist Nutrafol. These brands sit alongside SmartyPants Vitamins, Onnit, Equilibra and Welly and the wider beauty business, including skincare company Dermalogica, makeup brand Hourglass and mass haircare player Tresemmé.
While prestige beauty has shown uneven performance in the most recent quarter, including a reported low-single-digit decline in Q1 2025 and low-single-digit growth for core skincare and haircare, Unilever’s wellness portfolio has emerged as a reliable outperformer, offsetting the division with double-digit growth. A double-digit sales lift for well-being was also highlighted in the company’s 2023 and 2024 full-year earnings, and sales for the wellness business have surpassed $2 billion, underscoring both consumer stickiness and category momentum. (The brand declined to give growth percentages from 2022.)
As the global wellness economy is projected to reach $9 trillion by 2028, up from $6.3 trillion in 2023, according to the Global Wellness Institute, Unilever’s deepening presence across hydration, hair health and nutritional supplements reflects a deliberate and scalable category investment where these brands are tapping into rising consumer demand. This positioning also carries strategic weight. Well-being is more than a bright spot in the portfolio; it’s a buffer against sales softness and a key lever in Unilever’s wider transformation strategy. In early 2024, the group unveiled a multi-pronged growth plan to revive product innovation and rebuild gross margins across all categories, after uneven performance and margin pressure in core businesses.
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The appointment of Fernando Fernandez as Unilever’s group CEO in January (following his tenure as both CFO and head of the beauty and well-being division) underscores how central the category has become to the company’s growth strategy. At a time when inflation and bottom-line compression continue to weigh on legacy segments like ice cream and homecare, wellness stands out as a growth option. “It’s [health and well-being] a category with significant tailwinds — high margins, high engagement and long-term relevance,” Fernandez told investors during Unilever’s first-quarter earnings.
As Unilever doubles down on its wellness ambitions, Solheim lays out the strategy behind them.
The performance formula
Unilever’s strategy for scaling its multi-billion-dollar well-being business is rooted in a deliberately “narrow and deep” model, applied both at the portfolio and brand level. “We’re building fewer but bigger and better brands,” says Solheim. “That means going deep with consumers, really understanding their needs, and ensuring our solutions are grounded in science to continue scaling globally.” Rather than chasing breadth, the company has prioritised clarity of proposition and depth within its chosen categories.
Each of the three hero brands occupies a distinct lane. Nutrafol leads with clinical trust and practitioner endorsement in the hair health space. Olly translates supplementation into daily rituals through playful, accessible formats and cross-generational branding. Liquid IV redefines hydration for everyday well-being, not just performance. “Each brand addresses a different consumer need — hydration, beauty from within, nutritional gaps — and we believe does so authentically to its audience,” says Solheim.
This tight portfolio also enables a greater focus on research and development (R&D), consumer insight, and market activation — without the distraction of internal competition. “It gives us a huge advantage in focus and agility,” he adds. “It’s not a volume game of how many brands you have; it’s about how well you deliver with the ones you do.” Maintaining clear category segmentation is also intentional. “We’re not trying to stretch one product across multiple adjacencies,” Solheim explains. “Each brand stays in its lane.”
Nutrafol, which Unilever first invested in in 2019 and fully acquired in 2022, exemplifies this approach. Solheim calls it “a category-defining business”, citing its emphasis on clinical backing and high customer retention. “More than 80 per cent of revenue comes from repeat brand purchases,” he says. “That tells you it’s delivering results.”
Fourteen clinical trials were conducted across Unilever’s entire well-being portfolio in 2024, but Nutrafol currently remains the most heavily researched brand, having completed 18 studies since its founding. This focused emphasis has helped solidify its credibility in a supplement space often met with scepticism, while strengthening its reputation with medical professionals.
To date, Solheim explains that each brand’s evidence approach reflects each consumer proposition. Olly’s innovation and research are driven more by behavioural insights and format testing like gummies, soft gels or mini packs, while Liquid IV leans on functional efficacy and hydration science. However, the executive is the first to admit that as regulatory scrutiny and consumer expectations rise, Unilever faces a need to scale up scientific rigour more evenly across the portfolio.
Olly, acquired in 2019, offers a more lifestyle-led entry point. Known for its colourful branding and gummy formats, the brand appeals to millennial and Gen Z consumers who are newer to the supplement space. “Olly has this optimistic tone,” says Solheim. “It’s colourful, inclusive and accessible. The gummy format opens the door to people who might never have taken vitamins before.”
That accessibility is supported by a modular product system designed around specific life needs such as sleep, stress, mood and hormone support. “It helps Olly become a daily ritual, rather than a one-off health purchase,” he explains. Equally, recent launches like Period Hero and Flawless Complexion (for teenage acne) demonstrate the brand’s ability to expand organically within its brand universe while remaining responsive to changing consumer expectations around health and wellness.
The group confirms that Liquid IV, acquired in 2020, has become the most globally scalable brand in its well-being portfolio. Originally a cult favourite in the US hydration market (buoyed by TikTok virality), the brand now operates in eight markets, including the UK, Australia, Mexico, and more recently, India and Brazil. “We’re seeing real agility come from our tight focus, meaning that we move fast, adapt locally and scale the right innovations for the brand,” Solheim says.
That agility has shown up differently across regions: in India, where hydration is still an emerging category, Liquid IV serves an educational function, introducing consumers to the idea that hydration can support energy and mental focus, not just sports recovery. To do this, Unilever has focused on localised marketing and online education, leveraging the benefits of daily hydration — moving from an occasional remedy or performance add-on to a daily habit.
In more mature markets like Mexico, the brand is winning with innovations like its sugar-free formula, responding to demand for functional but cleaner products. The focus and targeting have paid off for the bottom line where the brand confirmed that India and Mexico posted sales gains, respectively. Across all markets, its core proposition of hydration for everyday life, not just athletic recovery, is helping expand its reach among a broader set of health-conscious consumers.
Unilever’s tight portfolio strategy has also been an asset in navigating global expansion. Olly, for example, has entered the UK and parts of Asia over the past two years, leveraging direct-to-consumer (DTC) and curated retail partnerships, including Tmall and JD in China, as well as Watsons in Singapore, to test consumer appetite. Liquid IV has followed suit, gaining shelf space in drugstores like Boots, on Amazon and in beauty retailers such as Ulta Beauty across markets such as the UK, North America and Australia. Meanwhile, Nutrafol has taken up US shelf space in Sephora, and, as of July, in Ulta Beauty and Ubuy in China. “We’re not scaling for scale’s sake,” Solheim says. “We scale where there’s consumer readiness for wellness.” That strategy prioritises capital efficiency and cultural relevance, which is a necessary standing as wellness trends become increasingly fragmented by market and demographic.
Risks and growing pains
Solheim is candid about the challenges that come with a focused model. While a lean portfolio allows for sharper investment and quicker execution, it also concentrates risk. “We can’t afford a misstep,” he says. That became clear during Liquid IV’s Hydration Multiplier (a global bestseller for the group) pre-launch in India, where a misalignment on flavour led to a weaker-than-expected consumer response. “The lemon and lime flavour confused consumers familiar with traditional Indian citrus profiles,” Solheim explains. “We had to step back, refine the flavour profile and relaunch.”
But brand market specificity is only part of the equation. As the wellness market expands, so does the noise. Solheim flags a rising tide of misinformation shaped by conflicting claims, unverified products and wellness influencers muddying the waters. “Consumers are overwhelmed,” he says. “They don’t know what works or who to trust.”
This is where Unilever sees a competitive edge. “That’s why we invest in a dedicated R&D team for each brand [for example, in 2024, Unilever invested €987 million in R&D], conduct clinical trials and publish the results. It’s how we earn consumer trust,” he explains. Solheim believes this scientific infrastructure, coupled with Unilever’s global reach, will be the company’s defence strategy against a flood of fast-moving competitors. Bullish, he says, “hundreds of brands enter the space every year. They’re agile and loud, but few have our scientific backbone. When we find something that works clinically and commercially, we can scale it across 10 markets in a year. That’s not easy to match.”
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Still, speed is often where startups win, particularly in the early stages of category and product innovation. That’s why Unilever continues to pursue targeted M&A (mergers and acquisitions). “We’re always looking,” Solheim says. “But we’re picky. They need to be science led, digital first and consumer validated.” Fit is also paramount. If a potential acquisition poses to blur the lanes of Nutrafol or Olly, the team walk away. “We’re not just buying products; we’re buying the ability to grow with the founder, their team and their mission. If that’s off, it doesn’t work.”
Next, Unilever is eyeing wellness verticals where science, consumer demand and white space intersect. Key interest areas include women’s health, like perimenopause and menopause, personalised nutrition, cognitive support, sleep, and longevity. “These are not passing trends, they’re tied to real health needs,” says Solheim. He’s particularly drawn to companies with differentiated capabilities, such as diagnostics or AI-powered recommendations. “Wellness’s future is personal, measurable and backed by science. That’s where we’re placing our bets.”
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With its streamlined brand portfolio, clinical validation infrastructure and a disciplined M&A lens, Unilever’s well-being vertical is entering a critical execution phase. The next growth frontier lies in personalised wellness. Solheim points to advanced subscription models, diagnostics and content ecosystems as core to future engagement. “We’re building brands that live beyond the shelf,” he says, outlining a vision where consumer product journeys are data driven and clinically supported.
As for the next earnings cycle — and although some of Unilever’s wellness brands have doubled or even quadrupled in size since acquisition — Solheim maintains the group is “still in investment mode”, because as wellness evolves from trend to global consumer expectation, the pressure will mount to sustain topline growth and protect margins. “This isn’t about chasing fads,” Solheim concludes. “It’s about solving real problems for real people and doing it in ways that last. That’s where the growth will come from.”
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