If there's one word that's hottest in the consumer industry recently, it's health. During this year's National Two Sessions, Lei Haichao, director of the National Health Commission, gave a 7-minute speech "focusing on waist circumference" at a livelihood press conference, which topped the hot search list. Behind this news, jokingly called the "most hardcore health reminder in history," is an unprecedented rise in health awareness among Chinese people. When this health awareness translates into the consumer market, the business opportunities for healthy foods are being amplified. Observing products with strong sales performance in distribution channels in 2024, it's clear that the market share of healthy foods and beverages is gradually increasing: many distributors revealed that food and beverages主打健康功能牌 are growing rapidly among young consumers. According to Magic Mirror Insight research data, in 2024, medicinal and edible food supplement products saw explosive growth: gift box sales increased by 6.0% year-on-year, and sales volume grew by 27.7%, far exceeding the industry average. Young people's health awareness is rising, the proportion of those under 35 seeking dietary therapy and supplementation increased by 4.2 percentage points year-on-year. With policy support, consumption segmentation, and technological breakthroughs advancing in tandem, coupled with cultural confidence, the Chinese-style food supplement track has become a hot business opportunity at the ongoing Spring Sugar exhibition. Observing this year's Spring Sugar hotel exhibition, it's evident that many categories are undergoing health and quality upgrades, and many brands have joined the food supplement track, but their foundations and development momentum vary greatly. A few brands, through their insistence on product quality and innovation, stand out in a market full of imitators. At the upcoming Xibo City exhibition starting on the 25th, we found many medicinal and edible brands participating, including the leading brand Lao Jin Mo Fang. Today, we'll take this time-honored brand deeply rooted in the medicinal and edible food supplement track as a reference model for players in this field, by examining its brand development path.
The Big Trend of Chinese-style Food Supplements: Lao Jin Mo Fang Leads the Medicinal and Edible Track According to the "Tmall Health and Wellness Industry Consumer Scenarios and Insights," from 2020 to 2024, the Chinese-style health market size jumped from 26 billion yuan to 47 billion yuan, with per capita consumption increasing by 31% and transaction volume growing by 34%. Young consumers are more confident in Chinese culture, beginning to admire the health wisdom of their ancestors, and the concept of medicinal and edible food supplements has been effectively popularized. Facing lifestyle pressures and health issues like staying up late, sedentary work, etc., light nourishment has upgraded from an "optional" to a "necessity" for young consumers, driving the "national trend health" to break out of its niche. In the medicinal and edible track, Lao Jin Mo Fang can be considered an industry pioneer. On March 17, Lao Jin Mo Fang and Zhencao Special Diet Technology (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Zhencao Special Diet) held a listing ceremony for the "Medicinal and Edible Research Center," sharing the Chinese Academy of Sciences patented "turbulent ultrafine grinding technology." This technology might sound complex, so let's break it down:
First, with this technology, medicinal and edible ingredients can be ground to a fineness ten times finer than what other current market technologies can achieve, making the powder finer, tastier, and nutrients easier to absorb; second, during the grinding process, the nutrients of the ingredients are fully preserved, microbial indicators are controllable, and product quality is elevated. The power of turbulent ultrafine grinding technology lies in the fact that world-class high-end equipment manufacturers like Switzerland's Svent and Germany's Alpine have conducted extensive research, but so far, no industrial production solution has been found. Before the joint R&D by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Zhencao Special Diet, it remained one of the core technologies not fully mastered in China.
Lao Jin Mo Fang and Zhencao Special Diet hold the listing ceremony for the "Medicinal and Edible Research Center" Unlike brands that rise quickly through marketing and channel traffic, Lao Jin Mo Fang has been focusing on product supply chain in recent years. In addition to investing 1.1 billion yuan to build a health industrial park in partnership with the Wuhu government in Anhui, it has industrialized the traditional nine-steam-nine-sun process and developed proprietary grain grinding and washing/drying process patents. In March, Lao Jin Mo Fang also held its 2025 Strategic Supplier Conference, bringing together suppliers from across the country for raw materials and packaging to sign strategic agreements, integrating and improving its supply chain efficiency.
Lao Jin Mo Fang Black Gold Series: Setting a Benchmark for Quality Food Supplements After focusing on the product supply chain, Lao Jin Mo Fang's products have also been upgraded. The main exhibit at this Spring Sugar is their newly launched Black Gold series. Positioned as "good raw materials, good formulas, good craftsmanship," targeting consumers in first- and second-tier cities who care about health food ingredients, formulas, and processes, Lao Jin Mo Fang, as the "sesame expert," uses the Black Gold series to elevate the value of the sesame category. How do distributors choose products? They have their own criteria, placing more emphasis on actual product quality and market performance. In an era of diversified consumer demands, quality remains the core factor that impresses consumers. Compared with products that are eye-catching but lack differentiated competitiveness, truly quality products are the first choice for consumers and the best option to help distributors increase sell-through rates and explore incremental markets. In this regard, Lao Jin Mo Fang's Black Gold series is a typical case.
Lao Jin Mo Fang Black Gold series products Simply put, the quality of Black Gold is reflected in the following points: First, better raw materials. The Black Gold series uses authentic regional ingredients, i.e., high-quality ingredients produced in specific regions. For example, Lao Jin Mo Fang's black sesame raw material production area is located by Poyang Lake in Jiangxi, where the unique weak acidic red soil and warm climate with an average annual temperature of 18°C are most conducive to sesame growth; Lao Jin Mo Fang's Dangshen Yam Bazhen Powder selects Tiegun yam from Wen County, Henan, which has nearly 3,000 years of planting and processing history; Lao Jin Mo Fang's Bird's Nest Almond Seven White Powder uses selected bitter almonds from Chengde, Hebei... In addition to selecting raw material origins, Lao Jin Mo Fang's standards for planting and screening are also extremely strict. Taking black sesame as an example, it is regionally planted, cultivated in zones based on variety and grain color, after three rounds of thinning and strict screening, ultimately producing Lao Jin Mo Fang's gold-standard black sesame with a single plant height of 1.5 meters and a yield exceeding 100 kg per mu. After five screenings, three stone removals, two color sortings, and one metal detection, first-grade black sesame with a net seed purity of ≥99.9% is selected, far exceeding industry standards.
Lao Jin Mo Fang sesame planting base Second, better formulas. Lao Jin Mo Fang relies on ancient formulas and conducts modern research on them. For example, the formula of Dangshen Yam Bazhen Powder is inspired by the Ming Dynasty dietary conditioning formula recorded in "Waike Zhengzong," following the traditional 'medicinal and edible' concept for formula adjustment, using ingredients such as Dangshen and chicken gizzard lining. In addition, the efficacy of powder products needs to consider the addition amount of effective ingredients. Lao Jin Mo Fang has also optimized and upgraded the ingredient ratios, comprehensively considering efficacy, taste, and flavor, polishing the Black Gold series formulas multiple times to create more scientific formulas. For example, the Black Gold series Walnut Sesame Black Soybean Powder contains ≥40% first-grade black sesame from Jiangxi, with seven black ingredients added at ≥69%, and higher amounts of core effective ingredients. Thanks to the inheritance of ancient formulas and modern scientific formula innovation, the Black Gold series formulas were recognized by professional nutritionists at the 3rd China Nutritionist Conference in 2024, winning the "Scientific Formula Excellence Award" for nutritionist-selected healthy products.
Lao Jin Mo Fang Black Gold series products Third, better craftsmanship. Using the traditional nine-steam-nine-sun process, combined with patented grinding and washing/drying technology, and later the Chinese Academy of Sciences patented "turbulent ultrafine grinding technology" will be fully applied to the Black Gold series, enhancing nutrient content and quality. It is reported that the Black Gold series has launched six products, including Walnut Sesame Black Soybean Powder, Bird's Nest Almond Seven White Powder, Ejiao Red Ginseng Beauty Pill, and Dangshen Yam Bazhen Powder, and will continue to innovate around Chinese-style food supplements in 2025.
Lao Jin Mo Fang self-developed process patent certificate Profitable and Sustainably Profitable: Lao Jin Mo Fang Endorses Distributors with Its Brand For distributors, the core of a good product is both profitability and sustainability. This requires not only high gross margins and stable sales but also high market recognition that can support the long-term development of distribution channels. Through communication with many distributors, we found that in the "money-making effect" that distributors value most, Lao Jin Mo Fang also proves its brand through its actions: 1. Differentiated Innovation Enhances Product Competitiveness As market competition in the food and beverage track intensifies, differentiation has become key for brands to break through. Even in mature categories, innovation in taste, function, and even packaging can improve market performance. In 2024, some traditional beverage brands achieved growth through sugar-free and health-oriented innovation. Product differentiation innovation tests a brand's insight into the consumer market on one hand and requires strong supply chain support on the other. Lao Jin Mo Fang has maintained high sensitivity to the consumer market: in 2018, based on the insight that young consumers want convenient health nourishment, it pioneered the super hit product Sesame Pill, which was subsequently imitated by the industry. In 2024, it innovated with a low-GI, sugar-free, low-fat Sesame Pill, achieving low-GI certification while being 0 sugar, with fat content reduced by about 30% compared to regular products, meeting consumer demand for reduced sugar and fat intake. In 2025, it launched the Black Gold series, emphasizing "good raw materials, good formulas, good craftsmanship". In product R&D, Lao Jin Mo Fang invests over 10 million yuan annually, comprehensively enhancing differentiated R&D and innovation capabilities through school-enterprise collaboration, self-developed patented technologies, and introduction of external technologies.
Lao Jin Mo Fang Sesame Food Research Center 2. Building Brand Strength to Endorse Distributor Quality For some distributors, the brand's quality endorsement and promotional strength are the confidence to stock up in large quantities. Facing a dazzling array of shelves, consumers prefer brands they know, as the idea that "big brands are trustworthy" is still rooted in most consumers' minds. In recent years, Lao Jin Mo Fang has gradually strengthened its brand reputation through product and channel development. According to Zhou Yuan, Partner & COO of Lao Jin Mo Fang, Lao Jin Mo Fang's offline channel growth reached 200% in 2024, completing layouts in industry benchmarks such as Walmart, Pangdonglai, Snacks Busy, and Laobaixing Pharmacy, with comprehensive channel expansion.
Lao Jin Mo Fang's offline channels are flourishing In 2024, Lao Jin Mo Fang obtained Frost & Sullivan's "Global Sesame Pill Sales No.1 for 6 Consecutive Years" market position confirmation certificate, its products appeared at major international health summits like the China Nutritionist Development Conference, received official recognition as "Zhejiang Time-honored Brand" and "Hangzhou Time-honored Brand", and became one of the first brands certified under the national brand project "Chinese Gift". In March 2025, Lao Jin Mo Fang also won the "Forbes 2025 Consumer Industry Annual Value Brand" award. It is understood that in 2025, Lao Jin Mo Fang will deepen its "three-dimensional channel ecosystem," collaborating with many distributors to expand into chain supermarkets, convenience stores, membership stores, and circulation markets, building a thousand high-yield model stores and shaping channel benchmark brand momentum. The brand's strong development momentum provides distributors with a powerful quality endorsement. 3. Supply Chain Upgrades and Quality Improvements Benefit Distributors The brand's supply chain directly affects product gross margins. Many domestic food brands have developed rapidly through flexible OEM models, but OEM models not only have weak quality control leading to frequent product quality issues but also compress profit margins. In recent years, Lao Jin Mo Fang has self-built planting bases and directly sourced raw materials to further improve sesame raw material quality and price advantages, and partnered with the Wuhu government in Anhui to invest nearly 1.1 billion yuan, completing a health industrial park covering about 160 mu, with over 50 highly automated production lines and a million-level standardized workshop.
Lao Jin Mo Fang Health Industrial Park co-built with Wuhu government According to Jiang Kanji, Partner & CMO of Lao Jin Mo Fang, in 2025, Lao Jin Mo Fang, through the joint establishment of the Medicinal and Edible Research Center with Zhencao Special Diet, will not only share the Chinese Academy of Sciences' cutting-edge technology but also jointly innovate and develop around medicinal and edible raw material formulas and process technologies, targeting more food supplement scenarios, developing new formulas and products, and bringing consumers more scientifically formulated and better-tasting Chinese-style food supplements. From raw materials to production, Lao Jin Mo Fang, through its self-built supply chain and integration of upstream and downstream supply chains, can support the brand in improving product quality while effectively controlling supply chain costs and benefiting partners.
Conclusion Many distributors believe that health consumption will be a major market driver in 2025. This year's Spring Sugar is an important annual product selection node for many distributors. In addition to stocking up on cash cow products, they also need to moderately explore a certain proportion of new products as growth points for future market breakthroughs. Compared with fleeting internet-famous products, brands that focus on product refinement can achieve long-term development, as Lao Jin Mo Fang co-founder & CEO Zhu Yingying puts it: "In the next 20 years, the product supply chain will be the lifeline." We look forward to seeing more consumer brands that are consumer-oriented and continuously strengthen their fundamentals, creating opportunities and winning the future together with distributors!
** Interested friends can scan the QR code to contact us**