Trend tracker: Livestreaming in China, rising bird’s nest consumption amongst young Chinese in the spotlight

Livestreaming craze: International supplement brands benefit from China’s obsession for short videos​

Livestreaming is quickly gaining steam in China, and overseas health supplement brands such as Clinicians has benefitted from tapping into the trend.​

The New Zealand brand, the health supplement arm of Douglas Pharmaceuticals, saw its sales jump by 40% in the six months after it began conducting livestreaming sessions on Tmall Global.

It sells two products via livestreaming - a probiotic for women’s health and a nasal spray. It has been engaging about 25 to 30 key opinion leaders (KOLs) to do so.

Health is wealth: Younger Chinese consumers make up 60% of bird’s nest purchases on JD.com​

Younger consumers in China aged between 16 to 35 made up more than half of bird nest purchases​ on e-commerce giant JD.com from July 2018 to June 2019.

According to data collected by JD, these consumers contributed 60% of purchases on the platform, revealing that consumption of bird’s nest was growing fast among this group of highly educated younger generation.

The data also found that the average annual growth rate of bird’s nest sales on JD.com grew at more than 50% over the past five years.

Natural, clean and sustainable: DSM highlights sports nutrition opportunities as demand rockets​

Growing consumer awareness, the rapid pace of urbanisation and rising disposable incomes are fueling the growth of the sports nutrition sector​, according to DSM’s Oceania nutrition leader.

Leah Davey, general manager at Oceania DSM Nutritional Products, highlighted the trends as DSM revealed upgrades to its Auckland facility, which will produce products for sports nutrition, early life nutrition, food & beverage, and medical nutrition.

The facility will manufacture sports nutrition premixes containing vitamins, minerals, and proteins. DSM is a supplier of PeptoPro, which is a peptide formulation derived from dairy protein that delivers amino acids to the muscles even at high intensity exercise, and Fruitflow, which is natural ingredient derived from tomato concentrate to support healthy blood flow.

More FSMPs to come: Nestlé Health Science China opens new product innovation centre​

Nestlé Health Science China has officially inaugurated its product innovation centre in Taizhou, Jiangsu province, to beef up​ the firm’s portfolio of Foods for Special Medical Purposes (FSMPs) in China.

It will operate in parallel with Nestlé Health Science product innovation centres in the US and Switzerland, sharing the core R&D technologies.

It will focus on developing products that cater to local Chinese taste and unique dietary habits.

Watch: APAC still on a growth spurt for probiotic sales – IPA​

APAC is continuing to drive the growth of global probiotic sales​, with China, Malaysia and Vietnam currently leading the charge.

That’s according to George Paraskevakos, the executive director of the International Probiotics Association.

We caught up with Paraskevakos on camera after his presentation at our recent Probiota Asia Summit in Singapore.