It's May. Which means the supplement industry is in full swing.
If you've been on Instagram this week, you'll have seen it. The shirtless before-and-afters. The "summer shred" programmes. The new ingredient that apparently nobody knew about until this month but which is somehow now the thing standing between you and the body you want by July. Every brand has a summer campaign, and most of them are running the same one.
I find this time of year genuinely frustrating. Not because I'm above marketing, but because I think most of what gets sold in May is built around a version of results that the evidence doesn't actually support.
And after years of building Innermost on the premise that we tell people what the science says rather than what sells, staying quiet about it feels like a choice I'm not prepared to make.
So this is our summer email. It doesn't have a hero image. It doesn't have a countdown timer. What it has is a straightforward account of what the research actually supports for body composition and skin health this summer, which is less dramatic and more useful than anything you'll see in a paid ad.
On body composition.
The evidence for what actually works is not new, not exciting, and not going to make anyone rich selling supplements. It is, consistently and across decades of research, adequate protein intake combined with resistance training. That's it.
Muscle protein synthesis, the process by which your body builds and maintains lean mass, requires two things: sufficient dietary protein to supply the amino acids needed for repair and growth, and the mechanical stimulus of training to trigger the process. When protein intake drops below roughly 1.6g per kilogram of bodyweight per day, the evidence shows muscle protein synthesis rates fall, and lean mass becomes harder to maintain regardless of how hard you train.
The summer complication is routine disruption.
Travel, social eating, less structure. The people who maintain their body composition through summer are not the ones who find some new ingredient in June. They are the ones who keep their protein intake consistent when everything else around them changes. That is the unglamorous truth and also, in my experience, the most practically useful thing I can tell you.
On skin health.
The evidence base is more nuanced but the direction is clear. Sun exposure degrades collagen at the dermal level through UV-induced oxidative stress, which increases matrix metalloproteinase activity and breaks down existing collagen fibres. This process accelerates in summer.
The research on hydrolysed collagen peptides and skin elasticity is robust enough to take seriously, but it operates on a timeline of eight to twelve weeks. Which means if you're thinking about starting a collagen supplement in August, you've already missed the window where it matters most. The best time to start is now.
What the industry typically does with this information is not my favourite. You'll see "shred" formulas containing diuretics dressed up as fat burners. Collagen products that contain 1g per serving, which is well below the doses used in the clinical trials the brand is referencing to justify its claims.
Trend ingredients with a handful of preliminary studies promoted with the same language used to describe ingredients with thirty years of peer-reviewed backing. The dose question especially never gets talked about, because the honest answer would make the product look expensive to produce at an effective level.
There's a commercial cost to the way Innermost does this. We don't run transformation campaigns because we don't think transformation language is honest about what supplementation can and can't do. We don't have a summer shred formula because the evidence for most of what goes into one doesn't hold up.
We don't run before-and-after imagery because it implies a causation between a supplement and a physical outcome that would require a lot more than a supplement to produce. Every one of those decisions costs us clicks, conversions, and customers who want to be told a more exciting story.
I think it's the right cost.
What we do have, and what I'd point you towards if you want something specific for summer, is this. The Lean Protein is formulated for body composition, with added inulin for satiety and a protein-to-calorie ratio that means it earns its place in a diet that isn't always as clean as you'd like.
And The Glow Blend contains hydrolysed collagen peptides at an evidence-supported dose, with vitamin C included because collagen synthesis cannot happen without it, which is a step most collagen products skip. We’ve also added biotin and folate, scientifically proven to support healthier hair and nails.
The protein will help you maintain what you've built if you keep taking it consistently. The collagen will start doing what the research says it does if you give it the time the research says it needs.
That's the honest version.
If you know someone who's about to spend a shed-load money on a summer supplement programme, forward them this first. It might save them some cash.
Until next time.
