S2B Group and BrandRank.AI Launch the First Food & Beverage Answer Economy Index
Debut index reveals which brands AI is recommending to GLP-1 consumers – and which ones it’s leaving out
April 29, 2026
Maha Tahiri, PhD and Laura Cubillos, RD
SAN FRANCISCO, April 29, 2026 – As consumers increasingly ask AI what to eat and drink, food and beverage recommendations are being shaped in new and often unseen ways. According to Gallup, one in four U.S. adults now use AI tools for health information or advice, and nutrition and exercise is the top use case – tied with symptom-checking at 59% of recent users.
Today, S2B Group and BrandRank.AI announced the launch of the Food & Beverage Answer Economy Index, an ongoing intelligence series that reveals what AI answer engines recommend and how they interpret, prioritize, and deliver food, beverage, and wellness guidance at scale.
The Index debuts with Eating in the GLP-1 Era, examining how leading large language models – ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Claude, Grok, and Perplexity – answer real questions about what to eat and drink on GLP-1 medications.
“AI has quietly become the most influential nutrition advisor in America – and most food brands have no idea what it’s saying about them,” said Laura Cubillos, registered dietitian, Co‑Founder and President of S2B Group. “AI isn’t just a tool; it’s a new way of seeing consumers at scale, shining a spotlight on the questions people are asking and the struggles they’re trying to solve. In the GLP‑1 era, brand choice increasingly happens before the shelf, inside AI answers that shape consideration. The Index turns that visibility into strategy, revealing which brands AI trusts, how to earn the recommendation, and how to become part of the solutions people are seeking.”
A Five-Stage Framework for Understanding GLP-1 Food and Beverage Guidance
The inaugural Index examines AI answer-engine responses through the lens of a first-of-its-kind five-stage GLP-1 Consumer-Patient framework developed by Maha Tahiri, PhD, Co-Founder and CEO of S2B Group and a leading expert and international speaker on GLP-1 and nutrition. The framework, first presented at the 2026 Future Food Tech conference, maps how nutrition needs, tolerances, and priorities evolve over time.
The five stages include:
Early Therapy (Starting)
Titration (Adjusting)
Stable Therapy
Maintenance
Recalibration / Transitioning Off
“GLP-1 is not a single moment – it’s a progression,” said Tahiri. “Each stage introduces different nutritional needs and questions. Organizing AI answers around these stages allow us to see how guidance changes, and why certain brands and sources appear when they do.”
The Consumer-Patient is all these things simultaneously: a patient, a shopper, a decision-maker. And they’re standing at the grocery aisle right now, holding a product that wasn’t designed with them in mind.
Select Findings
The Food & Beverage Answer Economy Index analyzes how answer engines respond to high-frequency, stage-specific consumer prompts, revealing which brands win, and which sources drive visibility – and importantly, which are absent. The examples below illustrate a representative slice of mid-April 2026 findings. The Index is updated in real time, with full details and patterns across all five stages and major answer engines.
Early Therapy (Starting)
Prompt: “What snacks are best for nausea on GLP-1?”
Brands frequently surfacing: Oikos, Chobani, Premier Protein, Wonderful Pistachios, FAGE
Commonly cited sources: Food Network, Medical News Today, Cleveland Clinic, EatingWell
Titration (Adjusting)
Prompt: “What protein brands work best for taste changes?”
Brands appearing across models: Orgain, Barebells, Premier Protein, Aloha, Garden of Life
Key influencing sources: Oncology nutrition guides, hospital-based resources, clinical health content.
Stable Therapy
Prompt: “Which high-protein brands support muscle preservation without over-suppressing appetite?”
Brands surfacing: Optimum Nutrition, Transparent Labs, Dymatize, Vega, Legion
Primary sources: Healthline, Forbes Vetted, AARP, performance and metabolic health publications.
Across stages, the Index shows that brand visibility in AI answers is dynamic, shaped by contextual relevance, intent, functional fit, and the strength of third-party signals. Brands and organizations not actively managing these signals risk being invisible at the exact moment a consumer is deciding – precisely when new loyalties are formed.
“Food choice is no longer happening at the shelf - it’s happening inside AI answers. In the Answer Economy, if your brand isn’t showing up when GLP-1 consumers ask what to eat, you’ve already lost the decision," said Pete Blackshaw, Co-Founder of BrandRank.AI and author of the forthcoming book "The Answer Economy: How AI Agents Will Decide Your Brand's Future" (Wiley).
Why Every Food & Beverage Executive Should Be Paying Attention
The scale of this shift is hard to overstate. CDC's most recent measured data shows that nearly 3 in 4 U.S. adults are now considered overweight or obese (NHANES, 2021–2023), and Gallup's 2025 self-reported survey shows the rate beginning to decline – down to 35.2% among men and 38.8% among women, with GLP-1 usage cited as a significant factor. Yet with researchers estimating a "boomerang effect" – people returning to their starting weight within 1.5 to 2 years of stopping treatment – GLP-1 is being reframed not as a short-term intervention but as a lifelong therapy. This is not a temporary consumer segment. It is a permanent shift in how a massive portion of the population eats.
“This is not a wave; it is a structural tsunami,” said Tahiri. “Whether you are a CPG company, a retailer, a B2B ingredient supplier, a foodservice operator, an e-commerce platform, a trade association, or an NGO, if you are not investing time to understand the new GLP-1 Consumer-Patient and the opportunity it represents, you are missing one of the most profound changes in the history of the food and beverage industry.”
About the Food & Beverage Answer Economy Index
The Food & Beverage Answer Economy Index is a real-time intelligence platform developed through the strategic alliance between S2B Group and BrandRank.AI. It combines large-scale AI response analysis, Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) intelligence, and deep food, beverage, and wellness category expertise. The result: a clear view of how AI-mediated answers shape brand visibility, vulnerability, and content-readiness – and strategies for becoming part of the answer. GLP-1 is the starting point, with future data shares planned around the nutrition and wellness topics where AI is most rapidly reshaping guidance, authority, trust, and consumer choice.
About S2B Group
S2B Group is a science-led, AI-native operating model built to help food, beverage, nutrition, health, and wellness brands shape what can be in an answer-driven marketplace. Founder-led and intentionally lean, S2B integrates strategic science, regulatory clarity, innovation, cultural insight, and marketing communications into a single, unified system – giving leaders senior-level expertise from strategy through execution without traditional agency layers. Working at the intersection of science and culture, S2B helps brands turn evidence into answers, category-shaping ideas, and measurable business impact. S2B’s AnswerSync™, powered by BrandRank.AI, is the only Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) system purpose-built for food, beverage, and wellness, designed to ensure science-backed truths are visible, trusted, and surfaced by AI. Visit: https://www.s2bgroup.com
About BrandRank.AI
BrandRank.AI works with over 60 global brands to strengthen trust and purchase intent by uncovering vulnerabilities, purchase-driving insights, and growth opportunities across AI answer engines. As a SaaS platform, BrandRank.AI tracks all major answer engines to improve visibility, ensure content is AI-ready, and rigorously measure brand claims and instructional accuracy. BrandRank.AI was recently named the recipient of Nestlé Canada’s 2026 “Small & Mighty” Top Vendor/Partner Award. Visit: https://www.brandrank.ai
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Contact: Laura Cubillos, Co-Founder and President, S2B Group, laura@s2bgroup.com