Launched three decades ago, Good Food has become the UK’s biggest food media brand thanks to its ability to diversify across platforms without diluting its core offering – trusted food expertise.
So why move into health, seemingly a world away from buttercream icing and the secret to perfect gravy?
The need for a trusted voice in this space has been given added urgency with the explosion of social media wellbeing content. This has been voraciously consumed by a health-conscious younger audience.
But with the ever-increasing number of creators, trends content is often contradictory or confusing. One recent study found that only 2% of nutrition content on TikTok is accurate.
Our own Good Food Nation research backed the idea that people are increasingly overwhelmed by health advice. The study revealed one in five don’t know which health sources to trust.
Nearly a third of younger people (age 18 to 24) are turning to social media for their health info – more than those who research on the NHS or ask a health professional.
This trust gap was something we needed to fill. Good Food’s health content has always been simple, realistic and accessible, written by experts and backed by research, but the time had come to think about how we could turbocharge multiplatform distribution.
Good Food was an early adopter of nutritional information for recipes. When the brand moved online in 2007, a health vertical soon followed, ultimately becoming the most popular area of the website behind recipes.
With the acquisition of sister brand Nutracheck in 2022, Immediate had the strong foundations for a comprehensive food and wellness category. And as it moved into podcasts, Apple News and reviews, health-led pieces continued to out-perform.
For the relaunched health proposition, we decided on a social-first sub-brand that links back to the brand’s origins while having a strong, separate identity.
@GoodHealthByGoodFood was born, with bright, modern branding that would stand out on social media and work across print and web. While healthy eating content would be central, we identified three other pillars: wellbeing, fitness and ‘your health’ (‘straight’ health but not veering into medical territory).
Our videos focus on healthy recipes, mythbusters and expert explainers underline our credentials in food, highlighting our health authority.
The in-house health team, including registered nutritionist Melissa Kuman is supported by regular contributors Dr Chintal Patel and dietitian Caff Rabess. We also selected influencers to help reach wider audiences. Qualified specialists, who already fitted with our science-backed, achievable health ethos. These include scientist @MrGutHealth, providing entertaining and accessible advice on improving your gut microbiome, and @SophieTheNutritionist for her practical and non-judgemental approach to healthy eating.
Posting 5-6 times per week across TikTok, Instagram and YouTube Shorts fits with the optimum schedule we’ve tested on @goodfoodeveryday. Quality is more important than quantity. Recipe videos have always been our best performing format, but myth buster and diary-style formats, and our ‘Most unhinged things I’ve seen on TikTok’ series have also found great success.
The launch period has produced some impressive metrics: as of February 2026 we’re just shy of 12k followers and 10 million views – from a starting point of zero just four months ago.
We’re still experimenting and continually looking at who we can work with, using live data on views, engagements and demographics to inform all editorial choices. While we know audience behaviour and platforms of choice will continually change, we’re confident that we’re in the right place right now, and we have the agility and innovation to adapt to whatever comes next.
Natalie Hardwick is Head of Multimedia Operations, Good Food
