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When it comes to supplements, less is more. That must sound strange coming from a supplement company, but hear us out on this. The truth is, most people don’t need more supplements — they need just the essentials. Instead, they’re buying the wrong supplements. Too many products, too much overlap, and no coherent goal in mind. We’re not here to make you feel bad about it, but we are here to help you straighten out your supplement stack and use fewer, better supplements instead of many useless ones. So, why should someone focus on the essentials? We’re so glad you asked. 

The Gap Most People are Filling Incorrectly

When people start supplementing, it’s usually because they heard some miracle supplement is good for them or will solve some problem that their doctor brought up at their last check-up. So they go to a vitamin shop, pharmacy, or someone’s supplement website and start looking for a cure-all. While the intention is good, the method isn’t. 

Even “healthy people seem to supplement the wrong way. Eating well can still leave some predictable nutritional gaps behind. And it’s not because their diet is bad, but because our modern food supply has left us with nutrient-poor meals, depleted soils, and lifestyle patterns that make nutritional gaps nearly universal. 
Something like 90% of Americans are deficient in an essential nutrient. And that holds true for foundational nutrients like omega-3s, probiotics, calcium, and micronutrients. It’s not an accident; it really is a product of a sedentary, nutrient-deplete lifestyle that follows most Americans. But what can we really do about it? The answer isn’t to take more and more supplements, but rather, to focus on the foundational ones.

What “Foundational” Actually Means

Foundational nutrients are essential vitamins, minerals, and elements that work on multiple body systems simultaneously to support total body health. These nutrients have the strongest scientific-basis and are strongly recommended by healthcare professionals across the spectrum. They also work to fill gaps that diet alone cannot. 

Foundational supplements are different than ones that “solve” a specific problem or make you feel good about using them. Foundational supplements work with body systems. Immune, cardiovascular, skeletal, muscular, and everything in between. While there’s nothing wrong with supplementing for specific issues, why hyper-fixate on one health concern when you can target multiple at the same time and support total-body health? We think that’s a better and smarter way to supplement.

Why Most People Skip the Foundational Nutrients

Most people skip the unsexy calcium supplements. Why? Because they’re not exciting. They don’t promise a dramatic transformation overnight. You won’t become superhuman and avoid going to the doctor. They’re slow, steady, and methodical, and for many people, that’s just not as enticing. 

And the supplement industry is no help, either. The industry doesn’t push foundational nutrients because the margins aren’t as good as trendy supplements. They would much rather market a “cure-all” supplement from this one specific extract from a magical tree in the Amazon with an entire marketing team behind it, than to push a good well-formulated multivitamin. So most people don’t really hear about the unsexy, but important nutrients that come from foundational supplementation. That’s why we’re obsessed with talking about them here at Woodstock Vitamins. We think the essentials aren’t sexy, but they’re smart, and they really do make a difference in your health.

Less Is Truly More

When it comes to supplements, we’re not trying to sell you stuff you don’t need. We’re trying to help you get the foundational nutrients your body is begging for. The ones that truly unlock total body health from the inside out. If you already have omega-3s, protein, calcium, probiotics, and a multivitamin that you love in your supplement stack, awesome. But if you don’t have your bases covered, it could be time to finally get the essentials in before adding anything else. After all, you’re supplementing so you can feel your best and live better. So start with the foundations. 

Not sure which of our foundational supplements you need for your health goals? Take the quiz.

One of the best parts of getting your supplements at Woodstock Vitamins is knowing that what you’re taking for your health and wellness was formulated by a pharmacist. Dr. Neal Smoller, to be exact. He’s a holistic pharmacist and supplement strategist with over 20 years of experience in the pharmacy setting. But having a supplement formulated by a pharmacist isn’t the only definition of pharmacist-formulated. There are other factors that play a role in this important term. Here’s why having a pharmacist create your supplements is such an asset. 

What Pharmacist-Formulated Actually Means

In a nutshell, “pharmacist formulated” means a product that was developed or designed with input from a licensed pharmacist. In our case, that’s Dr. Neal. He used his 20+ years of running a pharmacy that prescribes medications to give him the knowledge of how ingredients, nutrients, and substances interact in the body to help create a great supplement.

Safety First

When it comes to supplements, not all of them are made safely or with high-quality ingredients. That’s where having a pharmacist formulate your supplements makes a big difference. We focus on the Supplement Quality Standard, a rigorous framework that focuses on supplement manufacturing safety, quality, fair pricing, and sustainable, ethical ingredients. This is what sets great supplements apart from cheap, ineffective duds. Pharmacists are trained in drug interactions and dosing to ensure supplements avoid harmful combinations or ineffective ingredients. A pharmacist prioritizes safety and quality, in contrast to supplements not made by health professionals.


Science Forward

Unlike other formulations, supplements formulated by Dr. Neal are based on science. Pharmacists obtain doctoral degrees, which often means they have learned how to read, analyze, and even write scientific papers. A pharmacist-formulated supplement is often made to address a specific need (e.g., sleep support, digestion, skin health) based on scientific research. This is a big contrast to other formulators who use misleading claims, marketing buzzwords, or hype.

Fair Pricing

While many supplement brands are thinking about how to keep their product as cheap to make as possible and padding their margins, pharmacists like Dr. Neal are thinking about fair pricing for their supplements. They’re concerned with the dose of their supplement and if their customers are going to think the capsule is a horse pill or not. They’re thinking about third-party testing their ingredients and the cost to make sure their supplements are safe. They’re thinking about ingredient interactions and what’s going to sit well in the stomachs of their customers. Pharmacist-formulated supplements come with that additional thoughtfulness around pricing, fairness, ethics, and what’s truly going to be valuable to their customers, not just what’s valuable to their bottom lines.

Important Considerations

While “pharmacist-formulated” is a sign that a supplement may be of interest, it doesn’t mean it’s FDA-approved. It is still widely used in marketing and can convey a range of quality, safety, and efficacy results. So be mindful of which pharmacist formulated your supplement and their methodology. At Woodstock Vitamins, we aim to bring you the highest quality essential nutrients, with ethically-sourced ingredients and manufactured safely. You can learn more about Dr. Neal and our Supplement Quality Standards here. 

Woodstock Vitamins isn’t just another supplement brand. We know that’s what everyone says. But honestly, if we’re not here to convince you that you need a million unnecessary supplements in your medicine cabinet right now, then why are we even here? What is it that we seek to solve, and why are we hell-bent on being the ones to solve it? Here’s the rundown on why Woodstock Vitamins exists and what it means for you and your health journey. 

The Elephant in the Room: The Supplement Industry Sorta Stinks

We can all agree that something is fishy about the supplement industry. Why are there thousands of supplements in the United States, and yet people are still sick, tired, and riddled with health issues? The answer is two-fold: companies want to profit off of you, and most supplements don’t actually work.

There are too many products, protocols, and marketing out there that people are just straight up confused. What should they be taking for their health concerns? And who can they trust? Brands are overpromising what their products do while underdelivering. Companies are choosing profit (and making lots of it!) off you and your confusion. The worst part is that it’s intentionally deceptive. At the end of the day, when your medicine cabinet is full of supplements, and nothing is moving the needle, guess who’s left carrying the bag? You. For many people, the supplement industry is the Wild West, and no one knows where the sheriff is. 

That’s why Woodstock is bringing something different to the table. You see, Dr. Neal Smoller, our founder, holistic pharmacist, and supplement strategist, is one of the most vocal critics of the supplement industry. After serving in a pharmacy setting for nearly two decades and selling some of the country’s most popular supplements, he peeked underneath the hood of the supplement industry, and he didn’t like what he saw.  

What he witnessed were brands who shrouded their mediocre formulations with hype, shiny packaging, inconsistent quality, and little transparency. He got tired of selling people supplements that did nothing for their long-lasting health and wanted to create his own brand, one that would actually transform people’s health and not just say that it does. 

When Dr. Neal created Woodstock Vitamins, he had three main goals:

That’s the meat and potatoes of why we’re here and what makes us different. But that’s not all.

Helping People Get Foundational Nutrients; Not Just “Nice to Haves”

There’s one more thing we’re obsessed with here at Woodstock, and that’s offering our customers the foundational nutrients they need for total body health. That means we don’t offer trendy, hard to pronounce supplements from far distant regions of the world because they’re “cool” and “trendy”. 

Instead, we actually want you to take fewer supplements, but the right supplements. Those with the essential nutrients that work in multiple systems of the body, like your nervous, digestive, immune, and cardiovascular systems. These few supplements are what we call The First5. They are the first, foundational nutrients you need to get your body to work at its peak. 

These five supplements, we argue, contain the nutrients you need before anything else. So instead of spinning your wheels buying supplements that don’t work and don’t move the needle on your health goals, we exist to provide you with the truly essential nutrients your body is asking for: 

With these five supplements in your health routine, you’re setting the foundation for years of long-lasting health. And that’s what we’re here to help you achieve: simpler supplements for longer-lasting wellness.

Holding Your Supplements to a Higher Standard

Building off of the earlier section, the supplement industry stinks. We know this. There are lots of poor formulations out there, using unsustainably-sourced ingredients, that negatively affect your health and hit you hard in the wallet. We wanted to hold supplements to a higher standard. One that focused on: 

That’s where the Supplement Quality Standard comes in. A rigorous set of standards created by Dr. Neal himself to ensure that every single supplement that comes out of Woodstock Vitamins is well-formulated, manufactured safely, fairly priced, and made with people, animals, and the planet in mind. We offer the standards that other supplement brands do not, so you can finally trust that what you’re putting into your body is going to do the job and be good for your wallet and the planet.

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We Don’t Sell Supplements — We Offer Solutions for a Long, Healthy Life

Dr. Neal didn’t create Woodstock Vitamins to trick you into wasting your money on another health trend. He made it so you could finally have high-quality supplements that fill the nutrient gaps your body needs to thrive. We do that by creating supplements that affect nearly every system in the body in a way that builds the foundation for total-body health. So when you shop around our site or read our blog articles, you can trust that we’re giving you science-backed, no B.S. health information and solutions that will actually help you reach your health goals this year and beyond.