Vitacost


Vitacost.com, Inc. is an American e-commerce company based in Boca Raton, Florida, that sells vitamins, supplements and organic grocery products. The company was bought by Kroger in 2014. Vitacost was inducted into Inc Magazine's "Inc. 500 Lifetime Hall of Fame," in 2006 as one of the US's 500 fastest-growing privately held businesses for five consecutive years.

History

Vitacost began operations in 1994 as a catalog retailer of third-party vitamins and supplements under the name Nature's Wealth Company. In 1999, the company launched Vitacost.com and introduced proprietary vitamins and supplements, which has since expanded to include food, beauty products and sports nutrition.
The company completed construction of a manufacturing facility located in Lexington, North Carolina in 2008.
Effective September 1, 2012, Vitacost agreed to lease its manufacturing facilities to a third party provider.
On September 23, 2009, Vitacost went public. During 2010, the company expanded and upgraded its West Coast distribution facility located in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Company began a similar project for its east coast distribution center, located in Lexington, North Carolina in the spring of 2010, with the building construction completed in the first quarter of 2011.
In October 2012, Vitacost.com launched a cruelty-free specialty store showcasing beauty and personal care products that are independently certified by the Leaping Bunny Program, which is operated by the Coalition for Consumer Information on Cosmetics.
In 2013, Vitacost kicked off several new product lines, including a new sports nutrition line, ARO: Black Series, which includes pre- and post-workout formulas, protein powders, flavored glutamine, creatine and branched-chain amino acids.
Kroger announced in July 2014 that it would purchase Vitacost.com for $280 million. The acquisition was completed in August 2014.

Reception

In 2017, the company received two awards from the ConsumerLab.com Survey for Top-rated Supplement Brands on Overall Consumer Satisfaction and Top-rated Supplement Merchants on Overall Consumer Satisfaction.