Health x Wellness
Staying healthy and safe the fun way with Gumazing
Gumazing is a children’s gummy supplement brand that aims to help children cultivate healthy lifestyle habits in a fun way.
Ensuring that our children receive their daily intake of necessary nutrients can seem challenging for many parents and dreary for children themselves. Some children have selective palates, and while in certain stages of childhood, often prefer not to eat fruits and vegetables.
Gumazing was launched in 2021 with an ultimate goal of ensuring each growing child gets their share of enriching nutrients. Through their series of supplements, Gumazing encourages children to start early and cultivate healthy lifestyle habits in a fun way through colourful, tasty, and easily chewable gummies.
Multivitamin supplement 
Omega 3 supplement
We had a discussion about children, nutrition, selective palates and supplements with Krishika Bahirwani, Co-founder and Director of Gumazing.
the Active Age (AA): Can you share with us some of the challenges Gumazing found from parents about trying to feed their children a balanced diet?
Krishika Bahirwani (KB): In most cases, children rarely consume a balanced diet due to their dislike for vegetables and fruits, which are the primary sources of nutrients. Unfortunately, a balanced diet comprising the necessary nutrients is extremely important for growing children in their developmental ages. Thus, it is essential that they obtain those nutrients from other sources.
Parents often turn to nutritional supplements of all kinds. However, children are often averse to swallowing tablets and supplements in pill forms, which makes this solution challenging to execute as well.
As a parent myself, I was also extremely concerned with ensuring that my children grew up healthily with all the necessary nutrients. This issue became pertinent when I discovered that my children refused to consume fruits and vegetables because of their dislike for such food.
AA: Please share with us the story about how Gumazing decided upon using gummies as a supplement?
KB: The Gumazing team wanted to present a solution for parents who wanted to ensure their children consumed all the necessary nutrients for healthy development.
Regular tablet supplements were not feasible. Children do not like swallowing tablets, and many existing supplements were targeted towards adults, in terms of formula. The size of the tablets can also be difficult for younger children to consume.
As such, developing a fun solution that could encourage children to enjoy the process of getting their needed nutrients became the starting point for Gumazing.
Gummies are easily chewable and can be bursting with flavour while coming in bright fun colours, making their daily nutrient intake a fun process, instead of a dreaded one. Parents would be able to ensure their children required minimal coaxing to take their vitamins daily. More importantly, on a larger scale, this would help children associate fun with being healthy, encouraging them to develop healthy lifestyle habits from young.
More importantly, the Gumazing team factored in children’s biological inclination towards sweets. With children in their developmental stages, their caloric demands increase, leading them to be drawn to sweet-tasting food as an energy source. As such, the Gumazing team found the merging of the concept of sweets and vitamins into vitamin gummies to be a good potential solution for encouraging children to cultivate the habit of taking their vitamins daily.
While facing initial problems getting my children to consume nutrient-rich vegetables and fruits, I found the gummy form of the vitamins to be much more appealing to them. It was easy for my children to remember taking their vitamins daily because of its resemblance to candy.
AA: How did Gumazing decide upon what types of supplements or vitamins to select from, and to launch and retail?
KB: Along with my team, I shortlisted a list of necessary dietary nutrients and vitamins while keeping in mind the most basic nutritional needs of children, as well as their lifestyle habits. Based on their research, we concluded that children frequently faced vitamin and calcium deficiencies.
With the ongoing pandemic, the assurance that children’s immunities are strong is also a main concern of parents. Lifestyle-wise, children tend to be physically active during their growing stages, are in a period where they are learning and developing, and considering the current pandemic, many of them are also staying indoors for long periods of time.
Based on these factors, the Gumazing team shortlisted our key areas to be featured in their products. For instance, considering the concern for proper development, Omega 3 supports brain health and is vital for children’s growth. Essential for the healthy development of bones, Vitamin D3 is also another important vitamin children may be lacking. As sunlight is essential in providing the energy for vitamin D synthesis to occur, the indoor lifestyle many children have adopted in the age of the pandemic may mean a deficiency of Vitamin D among children.
The pandemic also brought focus on the importance of building stronger immune systems. Nutrients such as vitamin C which is important for proper growth, development, and the repairing of body tissues, as well as zinc, which is important for building a stronger immunity, were also chosen to be featured in Gumazing’s supplements.
Vitamin C + Zinc supplement 
Calcium and Vitamin D supplement
AA: What are some of the key features of Gumazing’s supplements?
KB: Gumazing’s supplements are specifically targeted towards children. These supplements are formulated to suit the most important nutritional needs of children and the line comprises multivitamins, Vitamin C, Omega 3, Vitamin C + Zinc, and Calcium + Vitamin D3.
These vitamins selected by Gumazing specifically target areas such as gut health, immunity, proper development and growth, as well as proper healing. With children being at an active age, minor injuries are common and Gumazing selects the vitamins to feature in their supplements to suit such active lifestyles of growing children. Likewise, their supplements also feature vitamins which boost children’s immune systems – extremely important considering the current pandemic age. It is important to provide parents with the assurance that their children are growing up strong and healthy, and Gumazing’s supplements zero in on vitamins that provide just that.
Another key feature of Gumazing’s supplements is its fun form. These adorably shaped, colourful, and tasty supplements appeal to children who are likely averse to consuming pills or vegetables and fruits, which makes it easy for parents to help their children cultivate healthy lifestyle habits. Easily chewable gummies also make for a smoother and more fuss-free consumption process for children. As such, we also made sure to closely monitor the texture and chewability of their gummies, such that they are easy to chew and swallow.
Additionally, our line of gummies is also gluten-free, artificial sweetener and colouring-free, contains no preservatives, is vegetarian, and can be conveniently stored at room temperature without melting. This makes the task of proper nutrient intake easier for both parents and children alike.
AA: How did the concept of Mr. Gumazing come about and why a male character vs. a female one?
KB: Gumazing wanted to help children cultivate healthy lifestyle habits by associating fun with being healthy. Apart from the fun gummy form, we also wanted to create a character that could help represent good health and encourage children to adopt healthy lifestyle habits.
Branding with a character can increase children’s inclination to taste and eat certain foods, and with Mr. Gumazing fronting all their different supplements and merchandise, this adorable character can easily grow familiar to the children, allowing them to associate eating well with something fun and affable. Gumazing designed this character with the fundamental idea of creating a superhero that encourages children to eat well, be physically active, and to enhance their health with vitamin gummies.
In a bid to allow children to connect with Mr. Gumazing as a fun friend and companion in their journey of adopting a healthy lifestyle, Gumazing gifts customers a mascot plushie with each purchase. Additionally, we also developed a line of merchandise such as shirts and drawstring bags with images of Mr. Gumazing engaged in various sports, consuming vegetables, studying and more. We want to use this friendly mascot to encourage children to adopt well-balanced and healthy lifestyles where they can learn and have fun healthily.
Additionally, Mr. Gumazing’s design is also an adorable take on and reference to characters such as Superman as a role model for children. The team wanted to create a character with a name that rolls off the tongue easily, while representing the brand, hence the creation of Mr. Gumazing – the friendly companion to children.
Image credit to Gumazing.
