Effective Use of Color for Nutritional/Food Supplement Brands
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Polish-based PMR, which researches central and eastern European markets, said in its report, "Non-pharmacy OTC market in Poland 2008", the buoyant market for food supplements would be curtailed if a range of herbal and other "borderline products" remain classified as medicines as is expected.
Polish law dictates that any borderline products that remain on shelves by 2010 will be registered as drugs and therefore limited in availability (prescription only) and distribution (pharmacies only).
A newly created government panel is expected to spend around six months establishing an electronic database of all on-market supplements and passing opinion on how they should be regulated as either food supplements or medicines.
Supplements solidarity
The market for food supplements and OTC pharmaceuticals was worth 1.3b Polish zlotychs (€380m) in all outlets including pharmacies, supermarkets and convencience stores in 2007, PMR senior pharmaceutical market analyst Monika Stefanczyk told NutraIngredients.com.
She said the nascent Polish food supplements market had achieved spectacular growth in little more than five years, as a result of a liberalising of medicines law. Around the same time about 100 drugs were made available as OTCs in non-pharmacy outlets.
But if further borderline products were not reclassified to enervate a market of predominantly young, urban middle class professionals with a growing interest in healthy lifestyles and dieting, growth was expected to dip below ten per cent, Stefanczyk said.
It would "slowly weaken between 2008 and 2010."
"If the Health Ministry succeeds in developing clear criteria for admission of drugs to non-pharmacy trade, the market might see significant changes as more products are admitted to distribution," she said.
Off-pharmacy
The regulatory liberalisation that had already occurred had seen a strong trade develop in non-pharmacy outlets such as supermarkets, small grocery stores, kiosks and petrol stations.
Sales of OTCs and food supplements accounted for 14 per cent of the non-pharmacy market in Poland from virtually nothing five years ago.
With such a strong market, particularly in food supplements which were growing faster than OTCs, many manufacturers were ramping up food supplements production, or adding additional lines, including multinationals selling into and operating within Poland.
But the situation with borderline products remained a concern. Like Germany, Poland has a strong tradition in herbal products and Stefanczyk warned the cost of drug registrations would force many products off-market.
This dilemma was a fundamental motivation behind the creation of the Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive (THMPD), which seeks to create a European Union-wide category of herbal medicines with its own registration criteria that lies somewhere between food and medicines law.
Functional foods
Stefanczyk said functional foods were also becoming more popular with vitamin and mineral fortification of a range of foods and beverages becoming increasingly common and categories like probiotics drawing the public attention as companies like Danone launched major multimedia advertising campaigns for products such as Activia.
While the health and wellness trend crossed all strata of Polish society, younger people were more likely to buy food supplements and functional foods and drinks because they had been won over by the 'prevention of disease through healthy dieting' message.
Older generations were much more reliant on usually expensive pharmaceutical solutions for existing ailments and also had less disposable income to spare for 'luxuries' such as food supplements and functional foods that often sold at a substantial price premium.
