The data: A handful of protein and nutrition bar brands dominate ChatGPT recommendations in the category, according to EMARKETER’s July AI Visibility Index (AIVI): US Food and Beverage, which tracks how brands appear in AI-generated recommendations across 16 food and beverage categories.

RXBAR posted the highest mention rate—appearing in 56% of ChatGPT recommendations for protein and nutrition bars—followed by Quest Nutrition (52%), Barebells and Clif (both 39%) and Kind (29%). For context, EMARKETER uses standardized prompts spanning product type, attributes, consumer needs, audience, and price to measure how often brands appear in ChatGPT recommendations.

Why it matters: With many consumers seeking more protein, ChatGPT’s frequent recommendations of RXBAR and Quest give those brands more opportunity to enter consumers’ purchasing decisions.

AI assistants can narrow a broad category into a small set of brands to consider, and there are already signs that this influence matters. For instance, ChatGPT users who were shown a brand recommendation were, on average, 2.5 times more likely to visit that brand’s website than a direct competitor’s, per a Similarweb analysis.

The brands leading the bar category also share a common theme: protein positioning. RXBAR, Quest, and Barebells are built around protein-focused products, while Clif Bar and Kind sell dedicated high-protein lines alongside broader nutrition bar portfolios.

Recommendations for health and wellness food brands: Marketers are allocating more budget toward AI visibility: they now spend nearly one-quarter (24%) of search or content budgets to AI visibility work, per a July Fractl survey.

There are steps health and wellness brands can take to optimize that spending and make it more likely they’ll appear in ChatGPT recommendations. Brands should build content around the kinds of questions consumers are asking in ChatGPT. They’ll need their content to match how consumers are phrasing questions in AI chatbots for the best visibility. Marketers should also consistently reinforce functional attributes like high protein across product websites, press releases, earned media, and social channels, strengthening the association between the brand and the attributes consumers may ask about. Additionally, track how mentions shift over time to see where visibility is improving or declining and adjust content accordingly. Structured data can reinforce clear and consistent brand information, but it isn’t a guarantee of AI visibility.