Scaler teardownScaler teardown · Gruns·11 min read

How Gruns runs ads: 40 personas, one gummy

Gruns took the AG1 formula, put it in a gummy, and scaled to a ~$1.2B outcome by running 30-40 hyper-specific persona angles at once - each one dumped onto its own advertorial, not a homepage.

Tier S · DTC supplements

Outcome

~$1.2B

reported acquisition value

Persona angles

30-40

running simultaneously

Intro offer

52% off

+ free shipping, sub < one-time

Target ratio

3x

LTV:CAC, scaled aggressively

The play

How Gruns actually runs ads

Gruns sells a daily-nutrition gummy - basically the trendy greens-powder formula, but as a chewable so you actually take it.

Instead of one ad for 'everyone', they make a different ad for every kind of person: one for 'girls who can't poop', one for people on GLP-1 (Ozempic-style) meds, and dozens more.

Each ad sends you to a little article that talks about exactly your problem - not the generic shop page - and then offers a big first-order discount to get you on the subscription habit.

The funnel

Walk the funnel, stage by stage

Click through the four stages to see how the hook, destination, offer and retention chain together.

Creator partnership ad, persona-specific

An iPhone-shot creator video opens on a hyper-specific identity ('for the girls who can't poop', 'GLP-1 users who feel run down'). Whitelisted through the creator's profile so it reads as a recommendation, not an ad.

Signature move

Creator-whitelisted UGC

The angles

The persona matrix

A sample of the 30-40 identity angles Gruns runs in parallel. Each one gets its own ad creative and its own matching advertorial.

"7 reasons GLP-1 users add Gruns to their routine."

Why it works

The four levers behind the scale

AG1's biggest friction is taste and compliance. Gruns didn't out-science the category - it out-formatted it. A gummy is easier to take, easier to demo on camera, and easier to talk about in a creator's own voice.

Steal this

The Gruns playbook

0/6

moves you're running

The takeaway

Why Gruns is the template

Gruns is the cleanest modern example of funnel congruency: a hyper-specific hook, a mirrored advertorial, and an irresistible intro offer, repeated across dozens of identities.

The brands that copied it (IM8, Mars, Create) all run the same skeleton. Study Gruns first and the rest read as variations on a theme.

Sources

What we read to build this

Related Shuttergen reading

Where to go next

The connected pages that compound on this one.

Run the Gruns playbook with your own ads

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