Felicity Cantwell.
Australians are shifting from transformation to maintenance in their approach to health, with happiness (54%) now the nation's top health goal ahead of weight loss (39%), according to The Growth Distillery's Australian Health Narrative research.
The study found 57% of Australians are content with their health status quo, while 68% are eating for functional reasons such as gut health or energy rather than weight loss.
Meditation and mindfulness has become the top health and wellbeing practice, and 38% have modified their fitness habits to make them cheaper or free.
Personal research now ranks as the top influence on health decisions, outranking professional advice.
"The transformation narrative is broken. Australians want brands that help them maintain consistency, not promise radical overhauls," said Felicity Cantwell, brand and content manager at The Growth Distillery.
"Success for brands will come from designing for real life: time-poor, cost-conscious consumers leading their own health journey and measuring success by how they feel, not how they look."
The research recommends brands champion maintenance over transformation, enable consumer autonomy over top-down authority, design for low-friction habits and measure success through wellbeing rather than external metrics.
The Growth Distillery is a research think-tank powered by News Corp Australia.
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