The company sold Omega-3 as a basic Essential - one SKU, low margin, low differentiation. I built the strategic case for repositioning it as a multi-product ingredient platform targeting life-stage specific needs, starting with the prenatal segment as the highest-value entry point.
19 slides covering the business situation, three evidence sources, product concepts, market sizing, GTM plan, LTV case, and risk mitigation.
After two years of strong ARR growth, the business had hit structural limits. The influencer pool in DACH and France was saturated - not because of spend efficiency, but because every reachable person had already been reached. LTV of €60 per customer looked healthy until you accounted for the 18-24 month realization window, which created a cash timing problem the unit economics alone couldn't solve.
Revenue was concentrated in a few top products and a few top influencers. That engine was decelerating.
The core insight from the portfolio matrix: Omega-3 sat in the "Essentials" quadrant - high repeat, stable revenue, but low differentiation and low margin. The "Complex Heroes" quadrant (multi-ingredient, premium, high LTV) had clear vacancies. The strategic question was: which Complex Hero to build next, and what ingredient platform could anchor it?
I stress-tested every alternative before arriving at a new product recommendation: geographic expansion required a 12-18 month minimum runway before meaningful revenue; increased ad spend faced diminishing returns on a tapped audience; retention-only optimization is defensive, not a growth lever. A new product was the only lever that simultaneously created a new reason to buy, unlocked cross-sell, reached new audiences, and opened a new influencer category.
The existing fish oil Omega-3 SKU was selling as a commodity ingredient. The strategic repositioning was to treat Omega-3 - specifically algae-sourced DHA and EPA - as an ingredient platform that could anchor premium complex products at each major life stage.
Algae-sourced DHA had two properties that made this viable: it eliminates the fishy taste barrier (the most cited reason for Omega-3 non-compliance), and it is inherently vegan, which opens a meaningfully underserved segment. In a market where competitors offered fish oil capsules or vegan capsules, a premium vegan gummy complex had no direct competition.
"Omega-3 is not a product. It is an ingredient that follows a person through every stage of their life - pregnancy, postpartum recovery, childhood development. We were selling it as a one-size product to everyone and capturing none of that specificity."
The platform structure across the portfolio:
Each new product uses algae DHA as the anchor ingredient, then adds clinically relevant co-ingredients for the specific life stage. The result is a product family that a single customer can move through over 5+ years - at zero incremental CAC per transition.
The recommendation was built on three independent data sources that all pointed to the same gap, from three different angles.
Pregnancy-related search queries on-site in 12 months. Customers were actively looking for prenatal products the company did not carry.
Signals across email replies, reviews, and support tickets - 47 direct safety questions during pregnancy, 23 explicit requests for omega-3 in gummy format.
Monthly category sales on Amazon DE with 41% YoY growth in "gummy prenatal" searches. Only 2 premium vegan gummy competitors existed.
The churn data added urgency. Women aged 28-35 were churning at 34% above the average rate - not because of product dissatisfaction, but because pregnancy forced them to stop taking existing products and look elsewhere. The portfolio had no answer for that life-stage transition. Every churning customer in that demographic was a retention failure caused entirely by a product gap.
Three products, designed as a connected ecosystem rather than standalone SKUs. Each one is a Complex Hero by positioning: multi-ingredient, life-stage specific, premium-priced, and anchored by the same algae DHA platform.
Eliminates the top two barriers in the category: fishy taste and non-vegan ingredients. Targets first-trimester users who already have morning sickness sensitivity.
Postpartum hair loss affects 50% of new mothers. Targets the specific depletion states that follow birth, converting a churn moment into a product transition.
Extends one customer relationship into a family account. Two products, one household, one ecosystem - the highest LTV in the portfolio at zero incremental CAC.
The market opportunity was sized bottom-up from consumption data in DACH, with Italy as a secondary entry market. The competitive gap analysis on Amazon confirmed the niche was real and unoccupied at the premium vegan gummy positioning.
Total German omega-3 supplement market. 11.5M consumers at avg €40/year spend.
Vegan gummy omega-3 in DACH. 20% gummy preference, 50% vegan preference applied.
DACH + Italy at 1.5% conversion. Algae segment CAGR: 16.8% through 2033.
A targeted competitive search confirmed the gap: "premium vegan prenatal omega-3 gummy Germany" returned 18 fish oil capsule results (not vegan), 6 vegan capsule products (not easy to digest), and 4 gummy prenatals using fish oil. Zero premium vegan gummy competitors at the Complex Hero positioning we proposed.
The business case was structured around three specific problems the platform solved simultaneously, not just revenue opportunity.
Cross-sell to existing Omega-3 and Hair Glow customers - no new acquisition needed.
Estimated for customers holding 2+ SKUs simultaneously, based on existing cohort data.
For a customer who moves Prenatal to Postnatal to Kids over a 5-year relationship.
Three phases designed to validate with zero-CAC internal cohorts before opening paid channels, and to build retail credibility progressively.
The most important reframe in this project was moving from "new product" to "ingredient platform." Proposing four new SKUs sounds like a large investment. Proposing a single algae DHA platform that unlocks four product positions across a 5-year customer lifecycle sounds like infrastructure. The same recommendation reads very differently depending on which lens you use to present it.
The three-source evidence structure was also deliberate. Any one data point - internal search queries, customer feedback, or Amazon data - can be dismissed as anecdotal. All three independently pointing to the same gap made the case much harder to argue against in a board setting. Evidence that arrives from multiple directions at the same conclusion carries significantly more weight than a single strong signal.
Starting with the churn data was the right entry point. The 34% above-average churn rate in the 28-35 female cohort reframed the entire conversation: this was not just a new product opportunity, it was an existing retention failure with an available fix.