The company launched MuscleBlaze Creatine Chews, a chewable creatine tablet, in the Indian market late last month.
Each tablet, which comes in an individual pack, contains one gram of creatine. In line with the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India’s (FSSAI) guidelines, the company recommends a daily dosage of three chews, which amounts to three grams of creatine monohydrate per day.
Speaking to NutraIngredients, Kaustuv Paliwal, senior vice president, said the company was hoping to capture a wider group of users beyond gym-goers through a more user-friendly format and by highlighting creatine’s cognitive health evidence - an area which the Indian consumers are starting to learn about.
“People are recognizing the importance of or are feeling the importance and effects of creatine on lifestyle and cognitive health. The chatter has started in India,” said Kaustuv. “These consumers may not be very comfortable with taking creatine in the powder format as compared to gym-goers, where powder creatine is the norm.”
Creatine has surpassed whey protein as the largest SKU in sales volume for MuscleBlaze in the past two years.
“At that time, sales of creatine were three times more than the year before. In the last two to three months, demand for creatine has become more stable, versus how it was one year ago,” he said.
Many consumers were exposed to creatine through social media and content creators such as neuroscientist-podcaster Andrew Huberman.
“It was largely in the last 1.5 years, especially after Andrew Huberman’s podcast on creatine, when he talked at length about creatine benefits for both muscular health and cognitive health, that’s when the chatter about creatine’s cognitive benefits first started,“ said Kaustuv. “One thing Huberman should be given credit for is simplifying technical knowledge for the general public, while sticking to facts and not bringing in personal bias...This was how sales of creatine went through the roof.”
Creatine’s cognitive evidence
Creatine is commonly consumed to support strength training, but there is increasing evidence pointing to its cognitive health benefits, including instances such as sleep deprivation at a dosage of 0.2g/kg to 0.35 g/kg.
While research is still in its early stages, emerging evidence suggests that doses of 10 to 20 g per day may be needed to increase brain creatine content.
“High doses of creatine (20 g per day or more) might be needed to cross the blood–brain barrier and elicit brain-related benefits in individuals facing metabolic stress, increased demands or inadequate cerebral synthesis of creatine—but not in all people,” Sergej Ostojic, a creatine researcher and professor in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at Texas Tech University, told NI previously.
Scientific consensus and industry standards widely consider a daily maintenance dose of 3 to 5 g to be safe and effective.
Making front-of-labelling claims
At the moment, MuscleBlaze has made front-of-the-pack claims such as increasing strength and powder, enhancing performance and supporting lean muscle mass for its latest creatine chew product.
Meanwhile, work is in progress to make appropriate and clinically backed cognitive health claims for this product.
In India, health supplements are not required to undergo pre-market approval; however, post-market surveillance is conducted to ensure that products fit regulatory requirements.
Elsewhere, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) had rejected health claims linking creatine with cognitive function in December 2024.
While EFSA’s Panel on Nutrition, Novel Foods and Food Allergens (NDA) noted that acute effects of creatine were observed for working memory, these effects were observed at daily doses of 20 g per day and not at lower doses, nor with continuous 5 g per day doses for six weeks.
Why not gummies?
Creatine gummy was another option that could be introduced for convenience and lifestyle users.
However, Kaustuv said he has opted for a dissolvable tablet to avoid potential creatine disintegration and stability challenges that could arise from water activity during gummy manufacturing.
“There are some ways in which a creatine gummy can be made while putting H20 reaction under control. This is something we are researching,” he said. “In the meantime, our R&D team understands stability challenges associated with creatine gummies and has come back with the concept of a dissolvable tablet where H20 reaction is not required.”
