Nurture Life shakes up brand image to connect directly with kids and spark conversation around food
Since launching in 2016, Nurture Life has doubled revenue year over year coupled with strong unit economics and operating metrics.
Nurture Life meals are formulated by a team of registered dietitians alongside the company's R&D chef (based on recommendations from the US Dietary Guidelines and American Academy of Pediatrics), and prepped and packaged at its new, state-of-the-art, USDA production facility opened in 2019. Its new production facility allows Nurture Life to operate as fully-vertically integrated company and has significantly increased its production capacity to serve its 5,000 subscribers throughout the HelloGreg44%US.
Going super kid-friendly
The company knew that its products -- freshly prepared, nutritious meals for babies, toddlers, and kids -- were top quality, but its branding needed some attention and refreshing.
"We’ve done so much work when it comes to our products and customer experience, and our story and our narrative and our messaging has not really reflected that," Chow told FoodNavigator-USA.
"We would get a decent amount of feedback that our brand wasn’t kid friendly, even though, at the end of the day, we created Nurture Life to serve kids. We would also get feedback that our brand looked a little bit more like health care, potentially pharmaceutical, and not necessarily like a direct-to-consumer brand."
Sparking a child, parent dialogue around food and nutrition
Nurture Life worked with Boulder, Colorado-based agency Moxie Sozo to develop its new packaging and revitalized brand identity. With illustrations such as a race car made out of pizza toppings and cold meatball sub drawn to resemble a submarine, the packaging is designed to speak directly to children about the food they're eating and help them understand nutrition fundamentals.
"It’s super kid-friendly but in a very purposeful way. Each meal or SKU has its own unique illustration, and the illustration is made from the ingredients that are in the meal. The whole idea behind the new packaging is to illustrate what is in the meals but in a very creative, vibrant, fun way," said Chow.
"The whole idea is to spark a conversation with kids to get them excited about what they’re eating, to get them not only to consume the food, but to start to ask questions."
Added flexibility and affordability
Nurture Life used to operate on a rotating weekly menu of 12 meal options, but is expanding its menu to 20 meal options to allow parents the ability to order the standard favorites that they know their child will eat.
"Parents wanted a level of certainty, to know that 'OK, my kid is going to eat this'. Because a lot of kids have their likes and their dislikes, and they're willing to try new things, but it takes multiple tries to get them comfortable and familiar and to like something new," explained Chow.
The changes allow customers to 'build their own box,' mixing and matching any combination of baby, toddler, kid, cold lunch, and family meals as long as they meet a minimum order of $39.
The company is also cutting the prices of its products. For its toddler meals, its highest-selling products, Nurture Life has reduced the average price of a meal from $9.40/meal to $7.99. Its kids meals were previously $10.40/meal and are now $8.99.
"We want to make Nurture Life affordable and provide more flexibility to our customers," said Chow.
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