Sampling for pharmacy and health
The category with the most word of mouth and the least freedom to use it. What a customer may say here is narrower than most brands expect, and it still works.
The rules here are the starting point
Pharmacy and health is a recommendation category. People ask a pharmacist, a friend or a parent what to take, and they act on the answer. The obvious conclusion is that customer content should be devastating here, and the code says most of what you would want to do with it is not allowed.
New Zealand's therapeutic and health advertising code, in force from 1 July 2026, means a person in an advertisement cannot say a product treated, prevented or cured something. A sincere account of a real experience is still a therapeutic testimonial if it makes that claim, and consumer testimonials for prescription medicines are prohibited outright.
What is left is still worth having: the occasion, the routine, the format, the reason someone keeps it in the bag, and honest talk about the experience of using the product rather than about what it cured. Campaigns in this category are briefed and moderated against that line from the beginning.
Briefed inside the code.
The moderation step is the reason this category is runnable at all.
Brief and check
Product, claim set and outcome, assessed against the therapeutic and health code before anything opens.
Match
An opt-in survey filters for people who already buy in the category.
Buy
They purchase at Chemist Warehouse, a pharmacy or the supermarket. Purchase verified.
Post, inside the line
Content covers occasion, routine and format, never therapeutic benefit, with the advertising label at first interaction.
Moderate and boost
Every piece is checked before licensing, and only cleared content is amplified.
Where health products are bought.
Chemist Warehouse went from 14 New Zealand stores in the 2020 financial year to 70 in 2025, and grew New Zealand sales 22.4% in the six months to December 2025. The channel has moved.
Chemist Warehouse
Volume and price-led, and growing fast
Unichem, Life Pharmacy
Advice-led community pharmacy
Independent pharmacy
Local relationships and repeat customers
Supermarkets
General sale medicines, vitamins and first aid
Health and wellbeing retail
Supplements and specialist ranges
Brand direct
Subscription vitamins and repeat supply
What a customer may not say.
This is the shortest list on the site and the most important one. The therapeutic and health advertising code has been in force since 1 July 2026, and content a brand has paid for is advertising.
None of it prevents a campaign. It changes what the campaign is for: familiarity, format, routine and occasion rather than efficacy.
- No therapeutic benefit testimonials. A customer may not say a supplement fixed their sleep or a product cleared a condition, however true it felt.
- No consumer testimonials for prescription medicines. Prohibited outright, with no exception for a genuine experience.
- Claims stay inside the approved set. Content is checked against the claims the product is permitted to make before it is licensed.
- The advertising label applies. Ad, Advert or Advertisement at first interaction on every paid post.
Pharmacy-ranged products, counted.
Labelled by the market the campaign ran in.
Beiersdorf, Nivea Sun and Elastoplast
Two pharmacy-ranged products bought together by real parents, packed into actual school bags and posted as a morning routine. The campaign was built on occasion rather than on efficacy, which is the shape a New Zealand health campaign has to take anyway.
- 16.3M total impressions
- 37x the organic benchmark
- 170 verified purchases
Kiwicare Weed Weapon
A different category, included as the New Zealand read on customer content against a brand's own paid advertising in the same campaign window.
- 2.78% click-through on customer content, against 1.07% on brand paid ads
- NZ$0.20 cost per click
Source: Kiwicare Campaign Report, January 2026.
What health brands ask us.
Can a customer say the product worked for them?
Not if that means it treated, prevented or cured something. They can talk about the routine, the format, the taste, the pack and why they keep buying it. The therapeutic claim is the line, and it is moderated before anything is licensed.
What about prescription medicines?
Consumer testimonials for prescription medicines are prohibited outright, so those products are out of scope for this kind of campaign.
If customers cannot talk about benefits, what is the campaign for?
Familiarity and consideration. Most of this category is lost at the shelf to a product people recognise, and a campaign that makes yours the familiar one is worth running even without an efficacy claim.
Who checks the content?
Our team, against the brief and the code, before anything is licensed or amplified. Content that crosses the line is rejected rather than edited into something the customer did not say.