GLP-1 drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy are transforming eating behaviour. Originally developed for diabetes, they slow digestion, regulate blood sugar, and suppress appetite. As millions adopt the Mounjaro jab, food intake could fall sharply, a seismic shift for an industry built on volume.
The scale is extraordinary. Analysts project the global GLP-1 market to reach around $126bn (£103bn) by 2029, with more than 40 million users worldwide. Some reports suggest snack food sales alone could drop by as much as $12bn (£9.8bn) over the next decade as appetite-driven consumption declines.
Mike Lee of The Future Market recently explored how different futures might unfold if appetite and access fundamentally change. There was one where food companies pivot to smaller, high-margin products to offset lost volume; another where appetite suppression triggers a major demand shock and brands collapse; a scenario where limited access keeps the system largely unchanged; and finally, one where public frustration over inequality fuels cultural and policy reform against Big Food.
It’s a timely discussion that we’ll no doubt hear more of in the coming year, as tensions between health innovation, inequality, and the survival of long-standing food models sit at the heart of the debate.
Big Food moves fast
It’s worth asking how Big Food (the large multinational corporations that dominate global food production and marketing) might respond. History shows it rarely stays still when its core model is threatened. The industry has always monetised disruption, especially when it risks losing volume.
If GLP-1s reshape how people eat, food companies may respond not by shrinking portions but by inventing new categories altogether – perhaps products containing micro-doses of GLP-1s, marketed as “metabolic support”. And if hunger and fullness stop driving purchase, brands will simply engineer new cues: emotional reward, self-optimisation, sensory novelty.
We’re already seeing hints of this thinking emerge. Drinks brands are exploring appetite-support claims, supplement companies are positioning themselves alongside GLP-1 usage, and investors are watching for “post-Ozempic” snacking trends. The response is likely to be reinvention rather than restraint.
Think of how low-fat, keto, probiotic, and protein trends were all quickly commodified and scaled. Most functional health foods already sell using cues beyond satiation, promising health optimisation, focus, calm, energy, beauty and longevity. The irony is that the fix for over-consumption and the problem of ultra-processed food may just be more ultra-processing, with continued claims to champion health.
If demand shifts, supply will follow, but this is likely to be through more food processing and engineering, not less. Even when the ask is for real food, industry tends to simulate it better.
Either way, it’s unlikely the future will just happen to the industry. Big Food will actively engineer it.
Amir Mousavi is a founder and food consultant at Good Food Studio
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