Suddenly, Multi-Vitamins Are The Hippest Thing In Beauty

Gwyneth Paltrow built her lifestyle brand Goop on her willingness to try the most extreme trends in wellness. Cupping, macrobiotic diets, steaming your hooha—she’s tried it all.

But now, Goop is branching out into the most staid of health products: the multi-vitamin. Sounds perfect for those who want Gwyneth’s healthy glow, without being quite so adventurous. Instead of booking a discreet steaming sesh, you can just add a few GP-approved tablets to your breakfast smoothie.

The new Goop Wellness consists of four different daily pouches geared to tackle problems like overstimulated adrenals, post-natal depletion, and slowing metabolism. The daily vitamin and supplement regimen runs $90 for a month pack or $240 for a three-month supply.

The packs are supposed to take some of the confusion out of the vitamin aisle. Gwyneth explained it like this in the Goop newsletter: “We enlisted our M.D.’s—Western doctors who bring a functional, Eastern approach to their practices—to create curated vitamin regimens to address the most common problems of ourselves and our readers, and we found a lab to create them that adheres to the strictest standards in the industry (GMP, and rigorous raw ingredient testing).”

Since this is a so-chic Goop product, the little vitamin packs include cheery colors and tongue-in-cheek names like “Why I Am So Effing Tired?” and “High School Genes.” There's even t-shirts to go with them!

Goop isn’t the only brand out there with a mission to make vitamins hip. Jen Atkin, celeb stylist for the Kardashians among others, is launching hair-focused supplements as part of her haircare line—and its packaging is every bit as minimal-chic as you'd want it to be.

Then there’s Care/Of, a new personalized daily vitamin regimen stocked with everything from vitamin D to milk thistle, all packaged in an artsy box that has your name printed on each pack. It will also soon have a different fun fact on each package to read while you’re microwaving your oats.

Why make vitamins so pretty? For one thing, you might put them on your counter and actually remember to take them every day. “We’re trying to take those little moments of fun that bring something fresh to the experience of taking vitamins,” says Care/Of co-founder and CEO Craig Elbert, formerly of Bonobos. “I am a believer in the power of aesthetics. Having things look attractive will make us more likely to be able to build the habit of taking vitamins and supplements.”

Another brand with cute, non-boring packaging you'd want to display is Hum, a four-year-old vitamin and supplement company. “I like to keep my vitamins on my vanity. I don't mind keeping it out with my other beauty products, so when I putting on my daily moisturizer and serums, they are right there and I remember to take them,” says Hum’s community manager Christa Pok. With products like “Runway Ready” (made with ingredients like biotin and black currant seed oil), Hum markets itself as a beauty product and is sold at Sephora. “Hum supplements really complement skincare. We like to think of ourselves as step zero in somebody's beauty routine,” Christa says.

These days, we’re more cognizant than ever on nutrition and how what we’re putting into our bodies affects our skin, hair, and overall health. So it make sense that your favorite beauty and fashion bloggers could upload photos of vitamins in their social media feeds. “I think what's happened is that fashion and lifestyle and wellness are all intermingling these days. It's just part of who we are,” Care/Of’s Craig says.

But this new crop of direct-to-consumer vitamins aren’t just lookers. There’s a focus on research, purity, quality ingredients, and transparency in sourcing and ingredient lists. Both Hum and Care/Of have easy-to-use quizzes on their websites to help you figure out the right mix of vitamins and supplements for your body and lifestyle. Another vitamin start-up, Ritual, packages up nine essential nutrients for women into an attractive little pill, along with maps on its website of exactly where each ingredient is from across the world. While not every skeptic is won over by this approach, thanks to these new brands, it definitely seems like taking your daily vitamins has never been this much fun.