The New York City-based brand, was one of the first to market as the creatine gummy category emerged to provide on-the-go convenience for an expanding audience of creatine consumers drawn by its potential to boost performance for mind and body well beyond its traditional muscle-building benefits.
“The opportunity to me was the build the mass market creatine brand that was focused on approachability, form-factor innovation and science-backed results,” said Dan McCormick, co-founder and CEO of Create. “As both a long-time creatine user and someone who is chronically online, I could tell the creatine space was ripe for disruption and growth.”
Create is using the funding—including $5 million raised in a recent Series A round led by Unilever Ventures— to invest in product development, expand its marketing efforts and grow its team. Earlier this month, the brand entered Target nationwide with its core orange, blue raspberry and sour green apple-flavored creatine monohydrate gummies, following what it describes as explosive year-over-year growth and strong projections that put it on track to scale three-to fourfold in 2025.
Here, McCormick discusses what went into building Create Wellness and how it remains focused on maintaining its category-leading status.
NI+: What went into the development and launch? What are some of the biggest successes and challenges you faced while building Create Wellness?
DM: At the time, creatine gummies were a novel product which meant we had to identify a manufacturing partner that would invest heavily in R&D with us to bring this product to life. We probably cold-called 20 to 25 contract manufacturers and finally found one that checked all of our boxes and was willing to do R&D. From there, we probably went through 12 to 15 sampling iterations before bringing the product to market and have been iterating and perfecting the product since. From a marketing perspective, we’ve benefited from really rapid word of mouth and a few amazing shoutouts from folks like Adam Levine, Joe Rogan, and a number of professional athletes. From a distribution perspective, GNC took an early bet on us and has been a great partner.
NI+: Could you tell us a bit about your scientific advisory board, how it came together and the importance of having two of the leading creatine researchers in Abbie Smith-Ryan and Darren Candow on board? How do they contribute to the company?
DM: We met Abbie before we even started the company, and in many ways, she helped shape our vision for the brand. In Abbie, you not only have arguably one of the leading creatine researchers in the world but also an archetype of the next wave of creatine users: a mother who balances work, family and fitness. I think she loved our idea of bringing creatine to a much wider audience and our commitment towards high quality ingredients and manufacturing standards. We met Darren a few months later on an intro from Abbie. Darren is not only one of the leading creatine researchers in the world but has done tremendous work translating his work for larger audiences. We work with our entire scientific advisory board on developing best-in-class products, understand the latest and greatest in creatine research and even collaborate on a number of research projects together.
NI+: How many gummies have you sold? What is responsible for your success?
DM: We’ve sold well over 250 million creatine gummies, which is about 83 million servings. There’s no one reason for success: I think we were early and on trend, take the work incredibly seriously and have built a great team and network of partners.
NI+: How have you iterated the formulation or the gummy matrix since launch?
DM: We are constantly improving our creatine gummies— everything from taste, texture, mouthfeel, potency, stability, etc. Some of these iterations are large (example moving from 1 g to 1.5 g per gummy) and some are small (tweaks in flavor.)
NI+: What new products have you brought to market since the first creatine gummies?
DM: We want to offer creatine products in convenient and delightful ways. That could mean putting creatine in a gummy. That could mean putting creatine powder in an on-the-go stick pack. That could mean matching creatine with a complementary blend of compounds. We aim to make taking creatine a delightful, daily experience and are less rigid on exactly how we do that.
NI+: For some time, this was a one-to-two-person operation. Have you been able to keep a lean team or has it grown considerably?
DM: Today the team is about 12 full-time employees based in NYC (and growing!). However, the overarching team across our partner network is much larger. Our operating cadence today is much different than it was just even a year ago and is more about building an enduring culture and less about squeezing as much efficiency out of as lean of a team as possible.
NI+: Who is the Create gummy consumer? Has the consumer base expanded as the science expands to support benefits?
DM: The Create consumer is anyone who wants to build a healthy daily habit to build strength, improve body composition and increase energy levels…which to me is almost everyone. We’re not a creatine brand for women or a creatine brand for men or a creatine brand for aging populations or a creatine brand for bio-optimizers. We’re all of those things. Creatine has broadly desirable benefits for a whole range of consumers, and we focus on the benefits versus targeting specific subsets of the population. This has been our approach, which of course has its own challenges.
NI+: What is responsible for the success of creatine gummies in general? Why such a good format? Is the gummy format as effective as the traditional powder?
DM: People love gummies! We’ve seen this across a number of different ingredients from ACV to greens to you name it. Creatine is no exception. It’s a good form factor because it’s convenient, portable, tasty and turns the taking creatine from a daily chore into a treat, which leads to better adherence and ultimately results. Based on what we know about creatine and gummies as a delivery form factor, yes properly dosed creatine gummies are as effective as powders. We’re excited to be releasing some clinical research on this in the coming months!
NI+: What sets Create gummies apart from other creatine gummies on the market?
DM: Our focus and quality standards. Beyond being the category creator, we’ve done things the right way and not lost focus. We use Creapure in all of our products and are probably only one of two to three brands that can make that claim. We are the only NSF for Sport Certified creatine gummy on the market. We do batch-level testing with Eurofins to ensure creatine potency and measure creatine degradation. And creatine is all we do—we’re not a supplements platform that will sell you whatever products we can. We focus entirely on offering best-in-class creatine products. That focus compounds overtime.
NI+: Noting the recent Target launch, how has Create’s bricks-and-mortar placement evolved? How do sales compare to e-commerce?
DM: We’ve always known that to achieve our mission, we need to be available where customers want to buy our product. At first, that started with our DTC website. We then expanded onto Amazon. Our first retail partners were GNC and Wegman’s. Today, we are available nationwide at GNC, Wegman’s, Target, Sprouts and The Vitamin Shoppe. Our e-commerce business is still larger than our nascent retail business, but we anticipate to have a relatively even split in the future.
NI+: How do you identify your flavors and what flavors appeal most?
DM: It’s a combination of personal flavor preference, what is feasible from a manufacturing perspective and customer feedback. Flavor is quite finicky, and we’ve found there’s no one flavor that has pulled away from the rest…everyone has their favorite!
NI+: How do influencers fit into Create’s marketing strategy?
DM: Create works with a number of creator partners to amplify our messaging. Our marketing goals revolve around general creatine education and specific education on Create’s products. We’ve found that working with creators of all types helps amplify that messaging.
NI+: How do you view the future of the creatine gummy market and what’s next for Create Wellness?
DM: We’re at a point where it seems like everyone is launching a creatine gummy—from the large supplement platforms to other emerging brands to anyone with an Amazon account. This always happens in hot categories. My view is that over time, there will be one to two true category leaders in this space that focus on high quality products, customer value and brand integrity. Create has every intention of maintaining our category leadership in this space, while also continuing to innovate and bring to market best-in-class creatine-forward products.
NI+: What advice would you give to other start-ups in the supplement industry?
DM: Focus. Don’t cut corners. Build a strong team and network of partners.
