For many couples pursuing parenthood, conception may be the only part of raising a child that doesn’t come with a price tag. For others, it’s a costly endeavor, with even a comparatively low-intervention procedure like artificial insemination running upward of $1,000 in a clinical setting. And health insurance may not cover fertility treatments until after a year of trying to get pregnant.
But today’s aspiring parents may have more immediate tools if they want to jumpstart their fertility journey. An at-home insemination kit from parenting brand Frida can be purchased at their local CVS for just $49.99.
“You’re not clinically considered infertile until you’ve been trying to get pregnant for at least 12 months. The reality is that most Americans are not as patient as that,” said Chelsea Hirschhorn, founder and CEO of Frida, which is known for its post-partum products.
In 2023, Frida launched its conception support lineup, including pre-conception supplements and ovulation tracking kits. Hirschhorn said Frida has sold over a million units of the fertility line and has seen sales grow 300% from January to December 2024.
After tackling issues like gut health and stress, the wellness industry is turning to another phase in women’s life cycles: fertility and conception. Frida is far from the only brand launching consumer-facing fertility products like at-home insemination kits and supplements that aim to bridge a gap between natural conception and costly clinical interventions. In April, supplement brand Perelel launched fertility-supporting antioxidants after receiving $6 million in Series A funding. In September, supplement brand Ritual launched a fertility-boosting powder. In October, fertility-tracking app Premom launched a line of fertility-aiding supplements and an at-home ovulation tracker.
And with more Americans delaying pregnancy until later in life, increasing fertility may be top of mind for new generations of parents. According to CDC data published in 2023, the average age for a U.S. woman or birthing person having their first child rose to a historical high of 27.5 in 2021.
As topics like “luteal phase” and cycle tracking become commonplace on social media, consumers are already primed to think about their reproductive cycles outside of a doctor’s office. Products like fertility supplements speak to a generation that is more open to taking their reproductive health into their own hands — and also increasingly anxious about environmental impacts and lifestyle choices on fertility.
“People are far more open about their fertility journey than they used to be. It’s still sometimes a source of shame and embarrassment, but much less than it used to be,” said Dr. Kristen Cain, board-certified OB-GYN and reproductive endocrinologist at fertility clinic Kindbody. “I think that’s very healthy. But it also does increase, to an extent, some anxiety about it. Because then other people are like, ‘Oh, maybe I should be concerned about this, too.’”
But by stepping into the fertility sector, the wellness industry also takes on a high-stakes topic that doesn’t necessarily come with a clear resolution. That requires brands to approach their marketing with both clarity and delicacy.
“We did survey our customers, and we saw that 87% who were actively [trying to conceive] were anxious. And we saw that, for close to half, it was actually negatively impacting their mental health,” said Ritual founder and CEO Katerina Schneider. “Less than 20% felt there were any resources to have honest conversations around those things.”
Ritual’s fertility supplement features ingredients like CoQ10, an antioxidant that has been shown to improve egg health. Ritual’s senior scientist, Adeline Grier-Welch, MS, MPH, RDN, said the brand uses ingredients that are backed by human clinical data in designing its supplements. Ritual has also pledged to perform human clinical studies on all of its final products by 2030.
But even with more information available to consumers on reproductive health, finding accurate data and sources can be a challenge.
“There’s a lot more open source information available now because of the internet and social media, but there’s also misinformation,” said Grier-Welch. “I see a lot of misinformation regarding fertility supplements, like recommending things that don’t have any human data, [based on my] big deep dive into the literature.”
It’s not only at-home women’s health products that aid conception that are receiving more attention. On Thursday, women’s health startup Teal Health received $10 million in investment, with Serena Williams and Chelsea Clinton among its backers. Teal Health’s Teal Wand, an at-home cervical cancer testing tool, is currently under FDA review.
Teal Health CEO Kara Egan hopes that the product will be available in California by the end of the year. She’s also aiming for the tool to be fully covered by insurance as a preventive measure.
The wellness sector as a whole has grown over the past decade in part as Americans have struggled to access traditional health care, with women’s health particularly neglected. According to the National Education Association, more than a third of U.S. counties lack a single obstetrician or birthing center. According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, obstetrics and gynecology medical residency programs saw a 5.2% drop in applicants during the 2022-2023 application cycle.
Egan hopes at-home medical devices like Teal can help fill in the gaps where women’s reproductive health remains inaccessible.
“It’s not that the doctors don’t care, but they really are just so overworked,” said Egan. “I think women have felt that nobody has been looking out for them.”
Dr. Cain said she would like to see more consumer-facing products, like at-home sperm testing, that can assist patients in their fertility journey. But while products like supplements can be useful, she said they are not a one-size-fits-all solution; lifestyle changes like quitting smoking or vaping can also be equally effective, she added.
But whether it’s through a supplement or cycle tracking, taking action can give aspiring parents a sense of agency in a process that is otherwise up to biology.
“Not being able to get pregnant easily makes you feel very out of control,” said Dr. Cain. “If it doesn’t happen easily, people feel like they failed or they screwed up somehow. Being able to do some things at home, in privacy, gives you that sense of control.”
