'Whole Health Marketing' Promotes Regenerative Organic to Consumers

Nils-Michael Langenborg, president & CEO of Sausalito, CA-based Whole Health Marketing, is something of a guru when it comes to regenerative agriculture and related strategies, and his company provides regenerative, customer-centric business strategies for people, the planet and prosperity.

Whole Health Marketing was founded nearly 20 years ago, when Langenborg started a category management consultancy for the natural foods industry, the first of its kind.  

“Since 2009, Whole Health Marketing has been heavily influenced by my MBA studies during my Green MBA program that focuses on ‘transformative’ business models,” he said. “We have always been focused on natural and organic products, whether food, supplements, HBA or ingredients.”

The company’s overarching philosophy is that “the customer owns the company” and that is at the heart of its core values.

Whole Health Marketing’s research process is pretty unique, as Langenborg has developed techniques that tease out the deep emotional connections that consumers have to their purchasing decisions.

“As a result, we can help identify the gold in the brand’s product portfolio and showcase it to meet the consumers’ deeply held emotional aspirations,” he said. “That can lead to social media campaigns, new product development, packaging iterations, retail channels and many other practical applications. And, most importantly, we’re focused on the financials and driving improved EBITDA and other financial KPIs.”

In an effort to grow its reach among organic customers, the company is looking at developing fresh produce programs for retailers with a certain growing approach.

“Not hydroponic, although there is a lot of activity in the vertical farming and indoor grow operations, whether climate-controlled or greenhouse that are making their way into foodservice, corporate dining and colleges,” Langenborg said. “The program we’re working on is still in development but may be released later this year.”

The key challenge, he noted, is to keep the value of organic relevant with consumers, every day. Whole Health Marketing conducted a national research study with 1,500 U.S. shoppers in February of 2018 and was stunned to learn that only 6 of 10 consumers trusted the USDA organic label. 

“That tells us there is still a lot of work to be done in educating consumers to the full holistic value proposition that is inherent to organic—including non-GMO by definition,” Langenborg said. “We are seeing some fissures in the organic movement with the emergence of groups breaking out with a different set of organic values that either say they’re going ‘beyond organic’ or are ‘doing organic right.’ We think that dilutes the organic promise to consumers.”

While he respects their passions and intentions, Langenborg feels it might be dilutive to consumer trust. 

“To fully committed organic consumers, these groups have appeal at various levels,” he said. “What we concern ourselves about is the larger ‘middle of the bell curve’ consumers that can create enormous markets by their sheer numbers.”

In 2020, the company is going all-in on regenerative, looking to become the leading marketing agency for those companies ready to embrace a regenerative economic future.

Langenborg explains regeneration is the process of renewal, restoration, and growth that makes genomes, cells, organisms, and ecosystems resilient to natural fluctuations or events that cause disturbance or damage. Every species is capable of regeneration, from bacteria to humans.

“That’s pretty powerful stuff,” he said. “As we face increasing pressures from climate change (warmer, colder, hotter, drier, wetter, etc.), the farmers have to look at their product portfolios with a new set of metrics that progresses to maturity. What used to grow consistently may now be severely inconsistent—a late frost, an early frost, a late rain, an early rain, hail, wind, flooding drought, invasive pests. These are real and increasing variables in portfolio management.”

Whole Health Marketing believes regenerative agriculture, carbon farming, no-till, syntrophic, silvopasture, agroforestry, and other techniques can offer the resilience farmers will need to survive.

“And, we believe the consumers will co-create those solutions with those companies that have the most transparency and focus on soil health,” Langenborg said. “We love organics. We love farmers, producers, suppliers, distributors, processors, brands and retailers that fully support the holistic and positive effects that organic production has on people, planet and prosperity.”