GHOST, during a pandemic, went into essentially three new categories in 2020, as well as expanded on their authentic collaborations across multiple products to repeat as Fitness Informant's Brand of the Year for 2020.
GHOST launched products in 2020 in nutricosmetics, gaming and beverage, taking the brand to new heights in 2020. GHOST also launched their Greens and Multi-Vitamin which was their entry back into the general health supplement world. On top of the launches just listed, we saw new flavors of GHOST Whey, which included an authentic collaboration with Nutter Butter; new flavor of Legend which was an authentic collaboration with Bubblicious, an upgrade on GHOST BCAA with additional flavors and more authentic collaborations and more.
GHOST entry into beverage was arguably their biggest move in 2020. They partnered with ABI (Anheuser-Busch InBev) to aid in the distribution of GHOST Energy into C-Stores and more. GHOST Energy featured two authentic collaborations, an extension of their on-going relationship, with both Warheads and Sour Patch Kids.
GHOST Gamer, our 2020 Product of the Year, took on a whole new market in attempt to win over gamers. Gamer is an efficaciously dosed supplement designed to improve game play and focus. GHOST not only released a supplement into the gaming world, they deployed their entire staff to become part of the culture.
GHOST Glow was the brand's attempt at nutricosmetics. Glow received raving reviews from customers and is one of our favorite supplements at FI. The nutricosmetic category has been largely untouched by sports nutrition.
GHOST Greens and Multi was the brands re-entry into the general health sector of sports supplements. Both their Greens and Multi formula received great reviews from those within the sports nutrition industry.
GHOST launched a collaboration with Maxx Chewning on their V2 version of the pre-workout, which we are told is foreshadowing for Legend V2 due out in quarter 1 of 2021.
GHOST grew sales in domestically and internationally for the fifth consecutive year. The brand's direct-to-consumer business saw increases in a year in which the industry took a hit from COVID. Brick and mortar retailers continue to seek out GHOST products to carry in their stores.
On top of all the great product launches, new apparel, collabs and sales metrics, maybe more important is what GHOST did on the humanity front. For every tub of GHOST Greens purchased, a tree was planted to help the earth. To date GHOST has planted 82,890 trees. The brand also donated $20,000 to help the efforts in Australia during the wildfires of 2020. GHOST also took to the social injustice movement making a public statement but also took action by donating $50,000 into local Chicago organization to help small businesses impacted by the cause. Lastly, the brand donated $10,000 in support of the Breast Cancer Research Foundation.
GHOST is a living, breathing brand. The owners, Daniel Lourenco and Ryan Hughes, inject their own personalities into the brand and into the culture. That comes through in branding and marketing. GHOST has a personality that is often imitated by never duplicated. Because of the success of 2020, the growth, the launches, and causes supported and the impact to the industry, GHOST repeats as our Brand of the Year.
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Final Takeaway
The Brand of the Year category was closer than a lot may think. Taking the fan's votes into consideration, as well as our expert panel, and reviewing all facets of what we deem to be in the Brand of the Year conversation, GHOST won the award.
For the second consecutive year GHOST performed and left the industry in a better place than we started in 2020. You can read about all the achievements the brand had in 2020 above, but deeper than that the brand strives to do right 24/7. That's something we can respect.
The other brands nominated, Core Nutritionals, RedCon1, Alpha Lion and NutraBio all had great years.
Core Nutritionals had their best year, in our opinion, with a full re-brand, reformulations and new product launches. They even won Pre-Workout of the Year. Doug Miller and his team should be very proud of what they accomplished in 2020. Core Nutritionals has a lot to be excited about as we move into 2021.
RedCon1 will always do well. The brand continued to grow their bottom line and distribution. Their international business increased in 2020. Their Amazon business increased in 2020. Their D2C business increased as well. The brand launched in Walmart in later 2020 and MRE RTD finally became a reality in November 2020. Had those two things happened in early 2020 we may have had a different conversation. RedCon1 will be a brand to really watch in 2021.
Alpa Lion became one of the fastest growing companies on Bodybuilding.com. The brand also did a re-brand of their own, essentially, with a shift to naming all SKUs under the Superhuman name. With numerous new products hitting in late 2020, Alpha Lion is poised for a great 2021.
NutraBio has already received our 2020 Philanthropic Brand of the Year award which put them into the conversation for Brand of the Year. The brand focused a lot of their efforts on the First Responder's campaign, making that a priority for the brand. We've been told that they are gearing up for a huge 2021.
This year was fun, exciting and motivating to see so many brands pick up the ball and run with it. Congrats again to the entire GHOST team on a great year. Congrats to all the other brands announced here as well. Thank you for helping move the industry forward.
