For decades, the US healthcare system has struggled to address the diet-related chronic illnesses affecting nearly half of all adults.
That changed in recent years with the discovery of Ozempic and other GLP-1 drugs that help people lose weight. While insurance covers these medications, doctors frequently require patients to see a nutritionist as part of their treatment plan.
“I would argue that GLP-1 for dietitians is the biggest tailwind that any single provider type in American health care has ever seen,” said Noah Kotlove, co-founder and CEO of Berry Street, a nutrition counseling platform that launched two years ago.
Berry Street, which provides registered dietitians with tools for managing an independent practice, just raised a $50 million funding round from investors including Northzone, Sofinova, and FJ Labs.
“We’ve grown tremendously fast,” Kotlove said. “It’s a very large market.”
Berry Street is one of several nutrition counseling startups booming because of GLP-1 medications.
Fay, a startup that, just like Berry Street, matches independent dieticians with patients, revealed on Wednesday that it has raised a $50 million Series B led by Goldman Sachs at a $500 million valuation. The funding comes just nine months after the company announced its $25 million Series A from General Catalyst and Forerunner Ventures.
Nourish, which raised a $35 million Series A last March, is another startup that offers similar services.
Kotlove says that the growth in GLP-1 usage is not the only factor driving people to seek nutritional therapy.
“If you have commercial health insurance, you most likely have really generous coverage to see a dietitian,” he said.
However, most people don’t know that nutrition counseling is typically 100% covered by insurance with $0 out-of-pocket for patients. “It’s arguably the most under-utilized benefit in all of the American health system,” Kotlove said.
Startups like Berry Street are making it easier for practically anyone covered by health insurance and concerned about how they eat to receive counseling from a registered dietician.
Berry Street allows registered dietitians, many of whom are also employed full-time in clinics, to start their own practices in the evenings or on weekends, which means that patients have more opportunities to use the benefit that they likely didn’t even know existed in the past.
Kotlove, a serial entrepreneur whose previous venture was a popular alcohol recovery app, has personally experienced the benefits of nutritional counseling. He says that he has been clinically obese since childhood.
“I tried everything to combat my poor diet,” he said. He was at his heaviest when a doctor recommended seeing a dietician.
“I left that visit thinking, ‘I know what the healthy foods are and what the unhealthy foods are. I don’t really need a dietitian to tell me that,’” he said. But he still gave nutritional therapy a try.
Then Kotlove was surprised at just how much his sessions with the dietitian helped him. “It felt a lot like therapy, but instead of talking about my relationship with my family members, or my partner, we were talking about my relationship with food,” he said.
He ended up losing 60 pounds and keeping that weight off. Another surprise was that all his sessions were entirely covered by insurance.
Kotlove’s transformation was the inspiration for Berry Street. He hopes that his company will help many people have similar transformations.
