SuppCo Is Launching Original Research, A New Chapter from Our Head of Science
Usually, I write these articles from from SuppCo's perspective. But today, I wanted to send this note personally.
We’re No Longer Just Talking About Research. We’re Doing It.
For as long as I’ve been at SuppCo, our role has been clear: to help people make sense of the supplement industry by translating research, questioning claims, and bringing transparency to a space that desperately needs it.
I’ve spent years reading other people’s studies, summarizing the data, pointing out where evidence is strong and just as often where it’s missing. That work matters. It always has. But for a while now, I’ve felt something pulling me forward…
If you truly care about science, you don’t just interpret it. You help create it.
Today, I’m excited to share that SuppCo is officially taking that next step.
We’re launching a dedicated research arm of the company focused on conducting original, unbiased scientific research. This research is not designed to sell products. It is designed to answer real questions that people actually have about supplements, especially the ones that are hardest to answer in a commercially driven system.
This is not a marketing experiment. It is not a brand study. And it is not science adjacent.
It is real research, done the right way.
And as Head of Science, this is one of the things I’m most proud of that we’ve ever built.
Why This Matters Beyond SuppCo
The supplement industry has no shortage of opinions. What it often lacks is perspective at scale and incentives that align with user benefit.
Most commercial research exists to support a product, a formulation, or a claim. That structure makes sense for businesses, but it leaves large gaps in our understanding. There are entire categories of questions that rarely get studied because no single company has a clear financial reason to study them.
Questions like:
Does this nutrient meaningfully work on its own, outside of a branded product?
What happens when common nutrients are combined, as people actually take them?
Where do benefits plateau?
Where are expectations misaligned with reality?
What outcomes do people care about that are not easily turned into claims?
At SuppCo, we sit at a different intersection. We see how people actually use supplements in the real world. We see stacks, not single ingredients. We see long term use, not short trials designed for marketing timelines. And we see questions that matter deeply to users, even when they are not commercially convenient to answer.
Launching our own research program is about closing that gap.
Not for SuppCo’s benefit, but for yours.
Research Without a Sales Agenda
One of the core principles of this research arm is that it will not be commercially focused.
Our goal is not to validate specific brands or to engineer outcomes that support marketing claims. Instead, we are focused on understanding the efficacy of nutrients themselves and, whenever possible, combinations of nutrients as they are actually used.
That means studying areas where users benefit, even when commercial incentives are weak.
It means looking at foundational health outcomes that take time, nuance, and scale to understand. It means asking questions that do not have obvious winners, tidy conclusions, or easy headlines.
This kind of research is harder to fund, harder to run, and harder to publish. But it is also the kind of research that actually moves understanding forward.
By removing the need for a product level outcome, we can focus on clarity instead of confirmation. We can publish results even when they are mixed. And we can contribute evidence that helps people make better decisions, not just more confident purchases.
Our First Study: Understanding Creatine Use at Scale
Our first original research project focuses on one of the most studied and still widely misunderstood supplements of all time: creatine.
In partnership with Oklahoma State University, we are launching what will be the largest survey based study ever conducted on creatine use in the United States.
This study is being run formally under an Institutional Review Board, following the same ethical and methodological standards used in academic research. That matters deeply to us. If we are going to do this, we are going to do it properly.
The study itself is intentionally simple and accessible.
Participants will complete a short survey looking at:
The types of creatine people use
Why they choose to use it
How well they understand creatine and its effects
How they track outcomes such as performance, recovery, cognition, or health metrics
What expectations people bring into creatine use and whether those expectations are met
Rather than testing a single outcome in a narrow population, this study is designed to provide a broad snapshot of how creatine is actually being used today.
The goal is perspective.
Once data collection is complete, we will publish a public facing report and submit the findings for peer reviewed publication, contributing directly to the scientific literature.
From Conversation to Contribution
One of the most exciting things I’ve seen at SuppCo over the past year has been what happens when people are given space to engage with each other.
Since launching comments on our articles and our post feature, where our community can share their own thoughts and ask questions, we’ve seen incredible engagement. People are not just consuming information. They are questioning it, refining it, and building on it together.
Research feels like the natural next step in that evolution.
It allows us to move from conversation to contribution. Not just talking about the questions that matter, but actually helping answer them. Instead of users only reading studies or debating evidence, they can now participate in creating it.
When I think about how to make the supplement space better for everyone, this feels like everything is coming full circle.
This Is Just the Beginning
Creatine is only the first step.
We plan to launch additional studies in the future, some survey based and some interventional, focused on the areas where real world use, user curiosity, and scientific uncertainty intersect.
These will not always be the easiest studies to run. They will not always produce simple answers. But they will be grounded in the belief that better evidence leads to better decisions.
And just as importantly, I want this research to remain something our community is actively part of.
Research should not feel distant or exclusive. When done well, it is collaborative. It is participatory. And it is one of the most powerful tools we have for raising the bar across an entire industry.
A Personal Note
I got into this field because I believe science works best when it is honest about what we know, what we do not know, and what is still worth figuring out.
Launching original research at SuppCo feels like a natural extension of that belief. It is us putting our values into practice and saying, clearly, transparency does not stop at analysis. It continues into action.
If you choose to participate in this study or future ones, know that you are contributing to something bigger than a single report. You are helping shape how evidence is generated in an industry that affects millions of people every day.
That is something worth doing carefully.
And it is something worth doing together.
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Jordan Glenn
Head of Science, SuppCo