Time to Put Science Back on the Shelf
Everyday health isn’t decided in a doctor’s office. It’s decided in a grocery store... in the four seconds a shopper takes to choose what goes into the cart.
ABOUT US
Step Change Innovations was founded on that single conviction, and on a hard lesson our founder learned over a decade of trying to sell great science to a skeptical industry.
WHY WE EXIST
The Innovation Gap
The wellness industry has a broken supply chain. Not for goods, but for ideas.
On one side, the ingredient companies: brilliant scientists with clinically studied probiotics, peptides, postbiotics, and botanicals that could genuinely improve people’s lives. Their reward for doing the science right is a sales cycle running 12 to 24 months, a calendar full of trade shows, and buyers who ask the same question in every meeting: “Who else is using it?”
On the other side sit the retailers, especially independent and regional grocers who have spent generations earning their customers’ trust. Their shoppers are asking for gut health, better sleep, sharper focus, and healthy aging. But without labs, doctors, formulators, and regulatory teams of their own, those retailers are handed copycat private brand programs that imitate national brands instead of leading them.
In between sits almost nothing.
Big CPG takes years to act on clear science. Emerging brands die on the vine under grocery economics. So shoppers end up stuck choosing products with great marketing vs. products with great science, because almost no one offers both.
We built Step Change as the in-between. One team that finds the world’s best ingredient science, turns it into finished products people actually want to buy, and puts those products on the shelves people already trust.
In months, not years.
OUR STORY
Born From 2,000 Products and One Hard Lesson.
Our founding team spent more than a decade at Ganeden, a Cleveland-based ingredient company with one great asset: BC30, a spore-forming probiotic with real clinical science behind it and almost no one willing to believe it.
Back then, selling a science-backed ingredient meant years of grinding. Educating buyers one meeting at a time, answering the same regulatory questions again and again, waiting out long development cycles, and proving over and over that the science was real.
Eventually, it worked. BC30 is now found in more than 2,000 products worldwide. In 2017, Ganeden was acquired by Kerry Group, one of the world’s largest food ingredient companies.
That outcome proved the science could win. The years it took proved the system was broken.
No great ingredient should need a decade and a small miracle to reach the people it can help.
So, in 2019, we started Step Change Innovations. Not to launch another brand or another ingredient, but to rebuild the path from lab to shelf.
Everything we learned the hard way at Ganeden became our blueprint: the buyer objections, the regulatory landmines, and the kind of proof buyers actually respond to.
The result is a faster way to market. Concept to shelf in about 180 days, with claims that hold up and products that sell.
WHAT WE BELIEVE
Our Operating Beliefs
The shelf is the finish line.
The store is where health decisions actually happen. Not the lab, and not the pitch deck.
Speed is a strategy.
A great idea that ships in 18 months loses to a good idea that ships in six.
Credibility is the product.
Real ingredients, real doses, and claims that hold up. Products developed with doctors and dietitians earn trust that marketing can’t buy.
Skin in the game.
We win when our partners’ products sell, so we build for repeat purchase, not just launch day.
OUR TEAM
Been There. Built That.
Our team blends grocery merchants and operators, medical professionals and registered dietitians, food scientists and formulators, regulatory specialists, and sales and marketing veterans. We’ve lived in the labs, in the boardrooms and on the retail floor... and we bring it all to every launch.
Joseph Bradley
CEO
Joe Muttillo
Chief Operating Officer
Dr. David Keller
Chief Science & Regulatory Officer
Chris Foltz
Senior Retail Director & Strategist
Vic Peroni
Chief Commercial Officer
Kristie M. Schwartz
Finance & Operations Director
Don Herbe
General Counsel Principal
Dr. Todd Pesek
Senior Medical Advisor
Let's Build What's Next
A step change isn’t just an improvement—it’s a powerful leap forward.
Whether you’re a retailer ready to own your wellness set or an ingredient company ready to prove your science at the shelf, the fastest path starts with a conversation.
Get Started!
Contact Us
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