How Cultural Fluency Built Trust and Grew Share in a Commoditized Category

The Challenge

A prominent Health & Wellness brand found itself in a saturated market where product functionality had become table stakes and consumer trust was elusive. Despite strong brand awareness, shoppers viewed its offering as interchangeable with lower-cost alternatives, limiting both loyalty and premium pricing potential. The brand needed to break out of the transactional mold and forge emotional connections, particularly among younger and multicultural consumers who were driving the category’s growth.

The Approach

The brand partnered with Collage to assess its standing through the Brand Cultural Fluency Quotient (B-CFQ) across diverse consumer segments. Results revealed that while Trust and Product Fit were on par with competitors, Relevance, Memories, and Advocacy were trailing – indicators that the brand was not meaningfully resonating with culture or integrating into consumers’ lives in moments that mattered most.

To close these cultural gaps, Collage Group guided the brand through an insight-to-execution journey grounded in consumer passion points, social and cultural trends, and everyday health rituals: