What Hims & Hers—and brands like it—signal about the future of medicine

If you read the recent profile on Hims & Hers’ design strategy and thought, this isn’t really about packaging, you’re right.

It’s about something much bigger:

The complete reclassification of healthcare from a clinical utility into a consumer-facing lifestyle category.

For decades, medicine existed in its own silo—cold, sterile, inconvenient, and functionally exempt from the standards every other consumer industry was forced to evolve toward.

Then beauty happened.

Beauty taught consumers to expect:

• elevated design
• emotional branding
• personalized recommendations
• frictionless purchasing
• products that fit seamlessly into identity and lifestyle

And now healthcare is borrowing that playbook.

Not because it’s trendy.

Because the modern patient no longer separates health from aesthetics, wellness, performance, and longevity.

That distinction is gone.

Hims & Hers has built a multi-billion-dollar business by recognizing this shift early—designing medications and treatment experiences to look and feel more like prestige beauty than traditional pharmacy. Their leadership has openly stated that healthcare is finally being forced to compete on user experience, trust, and design—not just clinical credibility.  

And whether traditional medicine likes it or not…

They’re right.

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Medicine Is No Longer Competing With Other Medical Practices

It’s Competing With Every Premium Consumer Experience

Patients are no longer evaluating healthcare solely on:

• credentials
• proximity
• insurance acceptance

They are evaluating it the same way they evaluate every premium purchase:

Does this brand feel modern?

Do I trust it?

Does it fit my identity?

Does this experience feel elevated?

Does this look like the future—or the past?

This is especially true in categories where healthcare and beauty overlap:

• Hair restoration
• Skin longevity
• Hormone optimization
• Weight loss
• Longevity medicine
• Sexual wellness
• Regenerative aesthetics

These are no longer purely “medical” categories.

They are identity categories.

Consumers are not buying minoxidil.

They are buying confidence.

They are not buying hormone therapy.

They are buying vitality.

They are not buying GLP-1s.

They are buying transformation.

And the brands that understand this are winning.

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The Rise of “Aestheticized Medicine”

What we are witnessing is the emergence of a new category:

Aestheticized Medicine

Healthcare delivered through the lens of:

• design
• branding
• lifestyle integration
• consumer psychology
• emotional resonance

This does not mean medicine is becoming less clinical.

It means clinical care is being wrapped in:

• better storytelling
• better UX
• better productization
• better behavioral design

Hims & Hers explicitly ties aesthetic product design to adherence—arguing that when treatment looks desirable and integrates into routine, patients are more likely to stick with it.  

That matters.

Because adherence has always been one of medicine’s biggest blind spots.

Beauty figured out long ago that if something is pleasurable, beautiful, and identity-congruent…

People use it.

Medicine is just now catching up.

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Why This Matters for Private Practices and Medspas

Many clinicians still think this trend is superficial.

They dismiss branding, packaging, and experience as “marketing fluff.”

That is a strategic mistake.

Because what Hims/Hers is proving is:

Design is not decoration.

Design is trust architecture.

In a world where:

• compounded meds are commoditized
• protocols are copied
• everyone can prescribe the same hormones/GLP-1s/peptides

Experience becomes the differentiator.

Not just clinical expertise.

Not just treatment plans.

But:

• How the care is positioned
• How the product is packaged
• How the patient journey feels
• How the brand integrates into identity and aspiration

The practices that understand this will build category-defining brands.

The ones that don’t will continue competing on price and prescription access.

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The Future Is Not Beauty OR Healthcare

It’s Beauty-Adjacent Healthcare

The smartest operators in medicine are realizing:

The future of premium healthcare will look less like a doctor’s office

and more like a luxury consumer brand with clinical infrastructure behind it.

That doesn’t mean sacrificing rigor.

It means delivering rigor in a format the modern consumer actually wants.

The next era of healthcare belongs to brands that can merge:

• Clinical credibility
• Behavioral psychology
• Consumer-grade design
• Lifestyle integration
• Transformation-based positioning

Beauty is no longer adjacent to healthcare.

Beauty is teaching healthcare how to sell, package, and deliver itself.

And practices that fail to adapt will increasingly look outdated—even if their medicine is excellent.

Because in the modern market:

The best care does not automatically win.

The best-positioned care does.