BevNET Magazine September/October 2022

BY JEFFREY KLINEMAN

Resurrection Fever is Spreading

For many founders, the sale of their brand to a larger company is the endpoint to the journey. Sure, there are consulting arrangements and slow fades, but it’s rare for an entrepreneur to fi nd a permanent home within the world of the CPG giants. Sadly, it’s also becoming a rare thing for many of the entrepreneurial beverage brands that are sold to strategics to make a long, successful run as well, and with the movement at many companies turning toward simplicity and core strength, there have been an inordinate number of established entrepreneurial brands available for those founders and executives who might be interested in a buyback deal.

That raises the question: Is it actually possible to engineer a successful brand resurrection? We’re about to see, as the lineup of founders who have either bought back their brands after selling them to a larger company – or, in the case of Seth Goldman and the tea business, set themselves up for an encore with a near-indistinguishable product – is growing.

It started with Jeff Dunn raising a massive fund and making one of its fi rst purchases the reclamation of Bolthouse Farms, after he’d watched acquirer Campbell’s - whom he’d sold the brand to in 2012 - sour on the business. Dunn also recently purchased Evolution Fresh, a juice brand that was once the upscale Neiman Marcus to Bolthouse’s Macy’s, and as our channel check shows, has identifi ed the room in the juice space to get Bolthouse back on the move.

Another guy hoping for a second squeeze of the orange is Matt McLean — everybody’s favorite Uncle Matt — who is a couple of years into trying to reinvigorate his own, eponymous juice brand. There’s certainly something to having control over the brand that’s got your name on it, and McLean was able to get to his company right before the window closed on the Dean Foods bankruptcy in 2020. McLean has changed the business’ sourcing a bit as a result of agricultural and pandemic-related factors, and the brand has also found traction, albeit in a smaller arena.

What is it about founders who can’t stay away, though? Seth Goldman reinserted himself into the fray over the summer, effectively moving into the philosophical condominium abandoned by Coke after the soda giant discontinued his fi rst big brand, Honest Tea, by launching Just Ice Tea as part of his current venture, Eat the Change. The free publicity that has accompanied the launch has given Just Ice Tea quite a bit of momentum as Goldman hacks together old friends, investors, employees and suppliers into a brand network.

While Goldman couldn’t buy Honest back from Coke, the soda giant did allow the rusted-out bodies of a couple of other brands it purchased to go back to their founders for new engines. The most prominent one, Zico, was bought by founder Mark Rampolla in early 2021. (Rampolla has actually become something of a collector of these kinds of brands, picking up Chameleon Cold-Brew from Nestlé USA earlier this summer as well.)

Bossa Nova is another long-buried brand that’s fi nally made its way home to its creator. Founder Alton Johnson was one of

the fi rst founders to try to incubate within a larger beverage company under a hybrid strategic/investor strategy when Coke’s nascent VEB group picked up a chunk of Bossa Nova for about $13 million. But the Acai brand struggled to fi nd its feet in the Coke system (sound familiar?) and was quickly sold to Sunny D.

Now that Johnson has Bossa Nova back, re-launching it as a line of botanic sparklers, he’s working with Neil Kimberley, a strategy savant who is fresh off a run in which he helped engineer the growth of Essentia Water. The kismet there, of course, is that Kimberley himself was part of the best known brand resuscitation in recent memory, that of Snapple. In the 1990s, the brand went on a roller coaster ride, selling to Quaker Oats for $1.7 billion, then getting fi re-sold to investor Triarc for $300 million in 1997, and then, with Jack Belsito and investor Nelson Peltz at the helm, being re-sold to Cadbury Schweppes in 2000 for another $1.4 billion.

Compared to the scale of these recent buybacks, Snapple had a lot more recognition and infrastructure, of course. Among this crop, Honest carried the most weight in the culture, while Bolthouse turned itself into a big player in the pre-HPP premium juice rush of the late 2000s. But thanks to the internet and social media movements, we’re also living in a time when niche plays don’t quietly go away – both Surge and Crystal Pepsi have been brought back over time as special items; a VC fund bought the rights to Slice; can TaB be far behind?

It’s easy to understand the motivations of the founders when they go back in for their brands. Goldman, for one, was clearly disappointed that the broad community of stakeholders in the Honest community was being effectively cut out of the business by Coke’s discontinuation of the tea brand. With Just Ice Tea he’s hoping to reactivate that network. For others, though, maybe it’s the opportunity to do it again, to do it right, to finish the job, only this time with the benefit of the right kind of experience, or better timing, or more startup cash, and the hope it might alleviate the emptiness that comes at the end of any long campaign.

The business case seems to be that these brands have either name recognition, solid brand fundamentals, or a cause that shouldn’t be abandoned. If they worked once, they should be able to work again, better and faster.

That’s not unique to beverages, either. Look at Jonathan Sebastiani buying back Krave Jerky from Hershey, or even the founder of fi tness brand TRX, Randy Hetrick, coming in to buy the company out of bankruptcy. Certainly KIND founder Daniel Lubetzky made a similar bet when he bought control of his company back from investor VMG. John Bello always wanted another shot with SoBE, to the point where he tried to turn Adina into SoBE 2.0. There’s something about your fi rst love, I guess, like a novelist bringing a favorite character back for another go.

There’s always another run, these founders believe, and for an increasing number, the reins are back in their hands. The big companies left their brands for dead – but there might be some life there yet. You just hope it’s a resurrection that comes closer to Snapple, and not Frankenstein.

BARRY

Fall is a Time to Spring Ahead

Boy, do I love this time of year. I just spent a most enjoyable day at the US Open, which is my favorite sporting event. Yesterday, I watched my Yankees sweep a double header at the Stadium. Best of all, my darling granddaughter Isabel started her pre-K at Horace Mann, the same school that her mother and uncle attended 30plus years ago. Life goes full circle. Our evenings are now crisp and the days aren’t so oppressively hot now. It seems that all is right with the world.

The fall is always a time when the beverage industry kicks into high gear. The trade show calendar starts to heat up. Next on tap are the Expo East and NACS extravaganzas. Both are in full fl ight with no Covid-19 restrictions. We actually had mask requirements for mass transit in New York lifted yesterday. Many other shows are also on tap, which will keep our BevNET team engaged, traveling and covering the excitement of a marketplace seemingly on the climb back to its prepandemic activity level.

We are being introduced to a plethora of new brands and SKUs. Many have been on the drawing board for a few years now, but are finally ready to be unleashed to the eager consumer base. Companies feel the time is right, and supply issues aside, they will put them forward. If you follow

our BevNET site you’re well aware of the frenzied activity on so many levels. Aside from the products coming out, there have been a flurry of hirings and firings as companies determine who will lead them in the months and years to come. Founders are stepping down, some by choice, others by board mandates, to bring a new leadership perspective to their brands.

I’m excited that many old friends are moving to new positions where they can utilize the skills and strategies that were successful in the past. They are either launching new companies or taking the helm of others that could use a new look.

On a personal note, I’m excited that Seth Goldman is back in the arena. He has always been a touchstone and conscience of the industry.

With all this activity comes the inevitable other side of bankruptcies and lawsuits that are part and parcel of this competitive marketplace. They captivate our attention as we follow the trials and tribulations of the combatants. It makes for compelling reading of our BevNET site. It’s all part of the game of beverages that we love so much, but it’s important to remember that these combatants aren’t just entities, there are people involved.

Regardless, enjoy the fall – and the new spring it represents.

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Bossa Nova Recruits Neil Kimberley to Steer Relaunch as Functional Sparkling Brand

Seventeen years ago, Bossa Nova helped create the market for acai juices in the U.S. Now, its founder Alton Johnson – working alongside beverage industry veteran Neil Kimberley, himself fresh off a nineyear stint as Chief Strategy Officer at premium water brand Essentia – is bringing the defunct brand back, although this time it will be dancing to a different beat.

Bossa Nova relaunched in August online and in California retailers with a line of functional sparkling waters made with plant-based ingredients like acerola, acai berry, dragonfruit, yerba mate and lotus flower. The seven-SKU line is built around various functional benefits including Immunity (Orange Acerola), Thrive (Raspberry Acai), Recover (Limelyte), Protect (Mango Dragonfruit), Energy (Lime Yerba Mate), Renew (Pinot Grape) and Relax (Pineapple Hop). Each 12 oz. can contains 5% fruit juice and sells for $29.99 per 24-pack online.

Johnson, who is serving as CEO, recruited Kimberley to serve as Bossa Nova’s president earlier this year, after the former Snapple exec bowed out of his role with Essentia in July, having helped build the company into a category leader and guided its exit to Nestle Waters North America in last year.

“I’ve been fascinated by the sparkling water space for a while,” Kimberley told BevNET in a call in August. “I came from Snapple, which is a flavor-oriented business, and then ended up at Essentia, which is very much about package, pricing and location in store. So I was always really intrigued by how you can merge together water concepts with the flavor experience that I’ve had.”

Johnson originally founded Bossa Nova Beverage Group in 2001 after learning about the health benefits of the acai berry; a bottled juice line didn’t hit stores until 2005 but made waves as the first RTD acai beverage in the U.S. The brand was later acquired by Beverage Holdings LLC in 2009 and placed in the same portfolio as Sunny D. Two years later, Johnson left the brand and the beverage industry altogether, making a career move into real estate. Without him steering the ship, Bossa Nova struggled under a mismatched brand management strategy and ultimately was taken off the market.

In 2017 Johnson said he was approached with an opportunity to repurchase the IP and, inspired by the growth in the sparkling water category, he began working on the new product lineup with plans to relaunch the brand as a whole new company.

Johnson told BevNET in a separate interview that he has been working full-time on the new Bossa Nova for about four years, attempting to fill what he sees as a white space for low calorie, plant-based sparkling beverages. While there have been a number of functional sparkling water entrants over the past few years – including brands like Recess, Good Idea, Limitless and Soulboost, among others – Johnson said he believes Bossa Nova

provides “a more elegant,” plant-based solution for consumers.

In particular, Johnson said Bossa Nova will be a more affordable option with a focus on breaking out into mainstream channels; “The plants have the ability to shine without it being a $2.99 premium single-serve,” he added.

While recent years have seen several relaunches of nostalgic legacy brands like Slice and Clearly Canadian, Johnson said he isn’t aiming to invoke the memories of the old Bossa Nova acai juice so much as he’s bringing the brand into the present day while remaining true to its platform of plant-based nutrition.

Beyond Kimberley, Bossa Nova has also hired another Essentia veteran: Patrick Katchak, formerly the director of national accounts - Central Division for the premium water brand, as its new VP of national accounts. The company has also hired a CMO with beverage industry experience, Johnson said. Zolezzi Enterprises CEO and founder Anthony Zolezzi has also joined as a co-founder and board member. The company is currently raising a friends and family funding round.

According to Johnson, Kimberley will play a vital role by overseeing much of the operational strategy and he is currently working to establish a distribution network for the brand as it rolls out to stores this month.

“Neil Kimberley, he is who he is and I thought he was the ideal partner to be the yin to my yang. I’m the product guy and I want to connect with consumers with this culture of plants with benefits,” Johnson said.

Kimberley said he is targeting small tastemaker retail chains to seed the brand’s brick-and-mortar presence, eyeing stores like Erewhon, Fresh Thyme, Earth Fare, Harmons and Molly Stones. Currently, he said Bossa Nova is in its “tweak process,” where the company will closely monitor early performance to ensure the packaging, formulation and communications are resonating with shoppers, before making a strong push into conventional channel outlets.

This new venture also places Kimberley in unfamiliar territory –startup culture. Although he played a pivotal role steering Essentia to its exit to Nestlé last year, the brand was already 15 years old when he joined the company. Now, Kimberley said he hopes the team’s broad beverage industry experience will help shorten the growth curve for Bossa Nova. But despite starting from the ground up, he said he’s looking forward to confronting the challenge.

“We used to say at Essentia that every year you stood at the bottom of the mountain and looked at the peak and wondered if you could get there. This is that, but I guess 10x right now,” Kimberley said. “So we’re standing at the bottom of the hill, looking at the top of the mountain trying to figure out ‘Okay, how are we going to get up there?’ And that’s the exciting part at the end of the day.”

Lance Collins, Mike Repole Reunite to Launch RTD Tequila Cocktail Casa Azul

With tequila and ready-to-drink (RTD) cocktails becoming two of the hottest alcohol categories, Lance Collins is looking to have a hand in both.

As the founder and chairman of tequila soda brand Casa Azul, launched in August, the beverage mogul behind Fuze, NOS, BodyArmor and Core is confident his new line of tequila soda will hit the sweet spot for consumers of spirit-based canned cocktails who enjoy the low-ABV and low-calorie qualities of a hard seltzer.

Collins, whose other beverage endeavors have reached stratospheric success, is positioning the 12 oz bright blue can in opposition to ranch waters or canned margaritas that use malt liquor by framing it as a product with a simple ingredient list. The 5% ABV sodas will come in four flavors and are made of sparkling water, tequila, natural fruit flavors and agave nectar.

“We’re reaching both hard seltzer drinkers looking for a premium offering, and canned cocktail drinkers looking for ease and convenience,” he said. “People want real spirits and quality ingredients, but also something that’s easy to drink anytime and anywhere.”

This is the first alcohol-based release from a team of beverage industry veterans whose latest innovations have made their marks in the wellness and energy drink categories. Former Glaceau president and BodyArmor chairman/co-founder Mike Repole joins Collins as a co-chairman of the board, along with Bryan Crowley as board director and interim president. Crowley brings over two decades of building and accelerating brands like AB Inbev, Pabst, and VEEV Spirits.

NOS Energy Drink, part of FUZE, and BodyArmor Super Drinks sold to the Coca-Cola Company in 2007 and 2021 respectively, with BodyArmor, which Collins co-founded with Repole, ranking as the beverage giant’s largest acquisition at the time at $5.6 billion.

Core Hydration was acquired by Keurig Dr. Pepper in 2018.

By bringing tequila into the mix, the founder is hoping to capitalize on the agave spirit’s upwards trajectory. Tequila was the second-fastest growing spirits category in 2021 according to the Distilled Spirits Council of the U.S. and canned tequila 355ml offerings increased share from 7% in 2019 to 31% in 2021, according to the IWSR. Casa Azul’s tequila is produced in Jalisco, Mexico, with the product crafted and canned in the U.S.

“It’s a broad audience because we’re bringing real Tequila to the party, but still offering something that’s low on calories and carbs and sessionable for daytime drinking,” he said.

The brand will join low-ABV tequila RTDs on the market such as Onda and Crook & Marker that also tout low-sugar and real ingredients, as well as canned line extensions from established names like Hornitos and Tequila Cazadores.

Throughout the year the company will be announcing “exciting celebrity and influencer partnerships” according to Collins, and has plans to continue to expand the line in 2023.

All flavors will be sold in single flavor 4-packs and a variety 8-pack with two of each flavor, an increasingly popular format for RTDs. The suggested retail price is $12.99 for a 4-pack.

The beverage initially launched with national distributor RNDC and was first available in California, Colorado, Texas, Georgia, and Florida. Plans to roll out in Mexico are also in the future.

Electrolit Names Christian Patiño Webb as CEO

Hydration beverage producer Electrolit has named former Red Bull senior director of marketing Christian Patiño Webb as its new CEO.

Patiño Webb comes to the company from Unilever, where he served as VP of marketing for SmartyPants Vitamins. He began his career at Procter & Gamble where he spent seven years, moving up from a fi nance and sales intern to become an associate brand manager for Herbal Essences. He later held executive level positions at Natural Hemp Company and Brandable, as well as spending fi ve years at Red Bull.

“It is an exciting opportunity to lead a brand with the legacy and momentum that Electrolit has and even more with the potential moving forward,” said Patiño Webb said in the release. “My focus for the company is to take the brand from a regional to a global landscape, becoming a talent incubator, and continue driving growth for beverage industry behind best in class innovation.”

A subsidiary of Mexico-based Pisa Pharmaceuticals, Electrolit was originally created in the 1950s as a medical-grade rehydration solution. The brand launched in the U.S. in 2015, positioning itself as both a sports drink and a hangover recovery beverage, and has now established a nationwide footprint – in over 30,000 doors across the country as of 2020.

According to IRI, Electrolit is now the fourth largest brand in the U.S. sports drink category, up 103.8% to $309.2 million in retail dollar sales for the 52-weeks ending June 12, 2022. Comparatively, Powerade ranks directly above the brand, up 3% to $1.25 billion, but private label drinks trail behind it, increasing 66.8% to $56.6 million in the same period.

The brand has continued to target mainstream consumers through its marketing efforts. In May, Electrolit partnered with Mexican racecar driver Pato O’Ward for the 2022 season and

mountain climber Juan Diego Martinez Alvarez. In June the company announced a new omnichannel campaign including TV ads, billboard, transit center displays, social media and influencers. The campaign intends to further Electrolit’s appeal to active consumers, featuring athletes and fitness enthusiasts.

Last year, Electrolit introduced a sugar free zero calorie line in Berry Blast, Lemon Breeze and Fruit Punch Splash fl avors, intended to meet consumer demand for low sugar drinks.

Seth Goldman’s Eat the Change Raises $14.5M to Fuel Just Ice Tea Launch

Eat the Change, the healthy snack brand founded by Seth Goldman, has raised $14.5 million in new funding to support its expansion into the ready-to-drink tea category.

In June, Goldman announced plans to launch a new organic bottled tea line called Just Ice Tea under the Eat the Change platform after The Coca-Cola Company said it will discontinue Honest Tea, which Goldman co-founded and ran from 1998 to 2019. The new brand, Just Ice Tea, is intended to “fi ll the void” for a clean label, semi-sweet tea drink that Honest will leave behind when it is offi cially discontinued later this year.

According to the Washington Business Journal, which fi rst reported the story, the latest fi nancing round was led by Collaborative Fund and S2G Ventures, which combined contributed around $10 million. Collaborative Fund founder Craig Shapiro and S2G senior executive partner Walter Robb will join the brand’s board as observers. Additional investors include Honest Tea co-founder and Eat the Change board member Barry Nalebuff, tea suppliers and some Honest customers, Goldman told the publication.

Eat the Change is now seeking an additional $500,000 in fi nancing to meet a $15 million goal, according to Goldman. The brand, whose core product lines include carrot chews and mushroom jerky, previously raised $4.5 million in March.

Goldman told BevNET in June that Just Ice Tea will launch with six SKUs. The fi nancing will go towards expanding Eat the Change’s manufacturing operations to support the new line in addition to distribution. The company also plans to hire at least six employees in the near future.

According to Business Journal, Just Ice Tea was scheduled to begin a pilot run in August and the drinks will start rolling out to select Maryland stores in September, with two more national retail partners set to begin carrying the brand in October. About 1,000 stores are already committed.

On LinkedIn in August, Goldman hinted that the brand will have additional news coming but did not specify beyond that.

“With the snacks, we weren’t always getting our calls returned, just because it was more unknown,” Goldman told Business Journal. “With this, it’s known — and there’s an urgency on the customers’ part because the shelf space is opening up; just because Coke is pulling out doesn’t mean that the category, or the consumer, has disappeared.”

BEVSCAPE

Class Action Alleges DFA Has Acted as Raw Milk Monopsony in Northeast

Dairy Farmers of America (DFA) is the target of a class action antitrust lawsuit fi led in July, alleging the largest national dairy cooperative has acted or has tried to act as a monopsony by constraining the Northeast raw milk market.

The complaint, fi led on July 29 in the U.S. District Court in Vermont, claims DFA has created a confl ict of interest with its member farmers by expanding into dairy processing, withheld profits from its processing operations, and has moved to control the Northeast raw milk market through “predatory and exclusionary actions” by coercing farmers to become members through acquiring competing businesses and exclusive supply contracts.

According to the complaint, the alleged actions began at least on May 10, 2016 and add up to DFA creating a monopsony – a single buyer market – for non-organic raw milk. That environment kept milk prices lower while simultaneously pushing competing dairy cooperatives “to the brink of insolvency,” allowing DFA to acquire the distressed organizations and further consolidate the market.

The lawsuit also claims DFA purchased milk hauling fleets that serviced non-DFA farmers and then withdrew services until those farms agreed to join the cooperative and also that it withdrew its fee-based marketing services from non-members as another tactic to force membership. DFA also allegedly sought to acquire processing facilities, removing more options for non-members.

Among the deals cited by the complaint are DFA’s 2017 purchase of Cumberland Dairy Milk Producers in Bridgeton, New Jersey; the 2019 merger of Vermontbased St. Albans Cooperative Creamery; its 2020 acquisition of defunct dairy conglomerate Dean Foods; and a 2021 exclusivity agreement with Wakefern Food Corp. to serve as the sole supplier for its Readington Farms branded milk bottling plant in White House, New Jersey.

While the alleged control would provide a challenge for independents in any sector of food and beverage, the suit notes the fast-paced nature of the raw milk

market – in which cows must be milked twice daily and the product is highly perishable – poses a more urgent threat for these non-member farmers who “could go out of business within days or weeks if they cannot access a market for their raw milk,” the complaint states.

The Northeast region includes 11 states, including all of New England, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and eastern Pennsylvania.

“The result of DFA’s anticompetitive, exclusionary, and predatory conduct is that it has reinforced and extended its monopsony buyer power over the Northeast market for raw milk (measured as a % of volume marketed), from approximately 40%-55% on the eve of the Class Period to approximately 50%-60%,” the complaint states, noting that one report estimated DFA controls 85% of milk processing in the Northeast region.

In a statement shared to media outlets, Kristen Coady, SVP, corporate affairs for DFA, called the allegations “baseless and completely without merit.”

This is not the only antitrust lawsuit fi led against DFA this year. In April, a class action fi led in New Mexico made similar allegations against the cooperative for its actions in the Southwest region. The complaint accused DFA of conspiring with Select Milk Producers Inc. to “stabilize and depress pay” for member farmers through price data sharing and skimming profits. Two of the law fi rms involved in this new case – Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP and Lockridge Grindal Nauen PLLP – are also representing plaintiffs in that class action.

Notably, the Southwest lawsuit is focused on a specific conspiracy claim, while the Northeast case revolves around monopsony, despite the end impact –farmers facing fi nancial distress due to price control – being fairly similar. However, the different violations alleged in the two suits means decisions made by the court in one case may not necessarily impact the other.

Beyond that case, DFA has been a frequent target of antitrust claims and other lawsuits over the past decade with

varying results. According to Lancaster Farming, “the co-op and other defendants agreed to pay a $159 million settlement with Southeastern farmers in 2013” and in 2016 a federal judge approved a $50 million settlement to be paid by DFA to Northeast farmers, however 116 of those farmers rejected the settlement and reached a new settlement in 2020 for undisclosed terms.

DFA also faced challenges in response to its acquisition of bankrupt dairy producer Dean Foods Co., which was settled for undisclosed terms in February 2021. Prior to that, the two companies settled a lawsuit alleging price fi xing in 2014 for $350 million.

Last year a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit fi led by farmers in New York asking DFA to be broken up. Also in 2021, DFA settled with the Maryland & Virginia Milk Producers Cooperative Association and Food Lion, who had sued the cooperative.

The lawsuits come at a time where the number of U.S. dairy farms has been in a decades long decline. A 2021 USDA report found 31,657 total licensed dairy producers in the U.S. in 2020, down 2,550 from the year before. Between 2003 and 2020, the total number of farms fell by more than 55%.

While the DFA cases deal primarily with non-organic milk, the issue has also impacted organic farms as well. Last year, Maple Hill Creamery and Danone-owned Horizon Organic both moved to terminate purchase contracts with Northeast family farms. In response, Stonyfi eld Organic announced it would invite impacted farms to join its direct supply program. Stonyfi eld co-founder Gary Hirshberg also founded nonprofit group Northeast Organic Family Farm Partnership to support the independent operations.

Meanwhile, Wisconsin-based cooperative Organic Valley is also making moves into the Northeast. In August, it announced 51 new member farmers in Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine and New York – its fi rst partners from the region.

CENTR Grows Inside and Outside CBD With New Product, ‘Traditional’ Execution

In a category buzzing with noise, CENTR has been quietly waiting for its moment to roar.

Thanks to its eponymous CBD-infused soda, the publicly traded Vancouver-based functional wellness beverage brand has emerged from the pioneering days of CBD drinks as a fast-growing category player. According to data from Brightfield Group, in the first half of 2022, CENTR, which is sold in stores in 25 states, had 1.03% share of the U.S. CBD beverage market, a category projected to reach nearly $192 million in sales this year.

With wind its sails, the company is preparing to amplify its message in the coming months, investing in marketing and releasing a brand new non-infused product line.

“A lot of the investments that we’ve made over the past three years are ones that you don’t see,” said CEO Arjan Chima. “We are really investing in the retailers through traditional beer-style marketing and advertising because that’s what retailers get and understand.”

The brand itself was created by a small group that included Chima and Paul and Melissa Meehan; the latter pair are the founders of distillery and spirits business Goodridge&Williams, maker of NUTRL Vodka, which was sold to Labatt Breweries of Canada, a division of Anheuser Busch InBev, in January 2020. NUTRL has since been launched in the U.S. as a ready-to-drink vodka seltzer. Chima was involved in that business as Chief Commercial Officer in addition to his work at the Meehan’s marketing agency, me&ideas. He subsequently has held various roles at CENTR including Board Member, CFO and President before taking on the CEO role in June.

The brand’s success thus far has been based primarily on service and execution, partnering with independent retailers and driving traffic for its two-SKU line of sparkling soft drinks in 12 oz. cans. During the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chima said the brand focused on independent groceries and c-stores, making the investments with those partners to keep CENTR on the shelf and in coolers. Healthy margins helped make their case; delivering 30mg of CBD for $4.99 per can, CENTR is more cost effective, even though Chima acknowledged consumers “aren’t there yet.” Consistent collaboration with retailers on promotions, temporary price reductions and ad buys “within their ethos and ecosystem” decreases the need for CENTR to constantly reinvest.

Whereas many startups seek out younger talent to handle field operations, CENTR sought experience, stacking the sales team with veterans from Red Bull, Gallo and across the beverage industry, which Chima said was invaluable in helping the brand become one of the first CBD drinks to be nationally distributed by Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits in April 2021, providing further market validation.

“It was sort of let us show you how we can do this together,” he said. “The conversations that we’ve had to convince the retailer and the distributor has been the experience on our team. Having done it from a top of the house level before and knowing how to invest properly in a brand, as opposed to just putting it on the shelf and letting it die.”

As for the product itself, CENTR is all about simplicity. The formulation uses a CBD isolate, rather than a full-spectrum extract. The can’s basic black and white design makes it more approachable for a wider age demographic, Chima argued, while focusing on a single, signature flavor available in regular (cane sugar) and zero-sugar versions with no natural or artificial sweeteners. That approach will continue as the brand creates more products.

“It’s kind of like how Red Bull just tasted like Red Bull before they started launching their other flavors,” Chima said. “For us, CENTR tastes like CENTR.”

And like Red Bull, the company has targeted c-stores as its primary growth channel. Along with brands like Kill Cliff (also distributed by Southern Glazer’s), CENTR is part of a cohort that is developing the segment as a path to bring CBD-infused beverages to middle income consumers that may not fit the yoga-and-wellness profile that other brands have attached themselves to. According to Brightfield Group, CBD-infused products generated $162 million in dollar sales in cstores in 2021, with that number expected to rise to $193 million in 2022, or about 4% of the total pool. The channel represents around 19% of the $175 million CBD beverage market.

For other channels, CENTR has other products. The brand has showcased more dynamic flavors (Pomegranate Hibiscus, Cucumber Yuzu) in its three-SKU line of powder drink mixes, but Chima sees CENTR’s non-CBD drink Enhanced, set for launch in October, as a “game-changer.” The single-flavor sparkling product will feature adaptogens and nootropic ingredients aimed at promoting immunity, mood, focus and other functional need states, and will be available in caffeinated (Enhanced+) and non-caffeinated varieties.

It’s become something of a standard play for CBD beverages to release a complementary non-infused line that can seed brand awareness in a larger pool of retailers that would otherwise not be available; see Cloud Water, VYBES, Recess and others. That’s why marketing and educating consumers about why to choose CENTR will be critical in fueling its continued expansion. CENTR will spend “significantly” on marketing and advertising in this fiscal year, Chima said, by investing in influencers and media buys, as well as experiential wellness-themed activations, one of which is scheduled for this Thursday in Los Angeles.

“That’s what’s exciting,” he said. “I’ve been waiting for three years to really invest in the marketing side of it and now we’re going to spend a considerable amount of money in marketing to drive our online sales, brand awareness and really leverage influencer partnerships.”

That work will focus around marrying functional wellness with active lifestyles, not exactly a stretch in California where CENTR does most of its business. But the brand is also looking to take the overall category into new directions. CENTR is the first CBD drink to do a digital media buy with rapid delivery platform Gopuff, while Chima said CENTR Enhanced is in discussions with New York University to study how functional ingredients included in the product can impact e-sports performance.

“People talk about the scale of [the category]; now if you’re gonna invest in it, you gotta invest in it properly and take that long term approach, as opposed to that quick adrenaline shot in the arm and hope someone buys you out,” he said. “That’s not our play. Our play is truly to build a business.”

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Brain Boost: Mindright Makes the Jump Into Chips

Functional food and beverage brand Mindright is moving further into the snack set with the launch of a new line of nootropic-infused puffed chips.

The chips arrive a little over a year after the brand fi rst launched its “brainboosting” bars. Though the brain health focused company fi rst made a detour into powdered beverages late last year, co-founder Chris “Bernie” Bernard said Mindright wanted to plant a deeper stake into the snack aisle.

“Year one was all about testing, making sure that the product fi t was viable and that customers were enjoying [the line],” Bernard said. “Now [we’re] staying in our lane with snacking and additives to support mood, energy and focus is the prime goal.”

Available in Chili Lime, Cinnamon Churro and Turmeric Ranch, the chips are sold on Mindright’s website and on Amazon with an MSRP of $4.99 per 4 oz. bag and 1.99 bag per 1 oz. bag. Along with a base of cassava fl our, potato fl akes and spices, the grain-free chips contain Mindright’s signature blend of nootropics including lion’s mane, vitamins B6 and B12, ginseng and L-theanine and are cooked in avocado oil.

While Bernard acknowledged the salty snack set is crowded, Mindright believes there’s still opportunity to launch cleaned up alternatives to conventional products. Consumers may not even fully grasp the functional benefi ts to start, cofounder Rob Dyrdek said – and that’s to be expected. The company hopes to fi rst lure in shoppers with attributes such as taste, and then use the functionality as a way to encourage repeat purchases.

“When we think about the product, a lot of people are going to discover it for the first time when they see it…We call it ‘capture, compel, convert’ in the way that the packaging is designed,” Dyrdek said. “It’s really trying to draw you in and then give you the benefits that go along with having a really high quality product with infused nootropics and adaptogens.”

The brand plans to expand distribution outside of ecommerce and into specialty and natural retailers across California and the Pacifi c Northwest later this year and has commitments for 800 doors, Dyrdek said.

The focus on brick and mortar stores comes after a slight revision to its distribution strategy. According to Bernard, consumers are still largely

discovering new products in store, rather than online. While the brand previously invested heavily in digital ads to send shoppers to its own website, it’s also reallocated some of that budget towards Amazon, which has proved to be a means of driving trial.

To support these marketing and sales costs, Dyrdek’s family offi ce, Dyrdek Machine, has invested another $1 million into the brand, bringing the company’s total funding since inception to $2.8 million.

Ultimately, the goal is to create a larger platform of products that span from morning to night, Bernard said. Other functional benefits such as sleep or beauty may come down the line, but right now brain health is the focus, in part because it’s easier to show an immediate effect, such as energy or focus.

“We’re a little bit ahead of [the trend] but nootropics are coming in a much bigger way,” Bernard said. “The data shows that these brands that are using these ingredients are continuing to grow at an exponential rate, and I think the market will catch up.”

Chamberlain Coffee Raises $7M to Support Omnichannel Growth

Chamberlain Coffee, the Los Angeles-based specialty coffee brand founded by YouTube sensation Emma Chamberlain, announced it has closed a $7 million funding round to fuel omnichannel business growth. The company had previously raised $1M during a seed round in 2020.

The round was led by venture builder Blazar Capital and Chamberlain herself, with participation from Ole & Steele/ Lagkagehuset founders Ole Kristoffersen and Steen Skallebaek, Grin founder Brandon Brown, D2C expert Nik Sharma and beverage industry veteran Ken Sadowsky.

“Chamberlain Coffee has grown exponentially since its inception, and this is only the beginning. In finding a group of investors for the brand who believe in and share our vision, we know Chamberlain Coffee will reach new heights and become the go-to coffee brand of this generation,” said Chamberlain Coffee CEO, Christopher Gallant, in a press release.

Founded in 2019 by YouTube star Emma Chamberlain, Chamberlain Coffee started off as a D2C brand that marketed a range of organic blends in whole bean, ground and steeped varieties. Since then, the business has grown into categories such as matcha, hot chocolate and chocolate covered espresso beans and into fl avored blends (Witty Fox Hazelnut and Fluffy Lamb Vanilla) while expanding beyond D2C into limited retail with partners including Sprouts, Bristol Farms and Erewhon and digital delivery market Gopuff.

With the new capital, the specialty coffee brand plans to grow its D2C —which accounts for 80% of its business — and retail presence even further.

Referencing Black Rifle’s Q1 2022 earnings call, Gallant said that a lot of coffee brands are facing declines in their D2C sales and their primary focus moving forward is in the retail channel. As coffee is still largely purchased at grocery stores, Chamberlain Coffee emphasized the importance of an omnichannel approach.

“It’s really important, at any company, to meet your consumers where they want to buy your product, whether that be in retail, on Amazon, on your own website, in cafes and foodservice channels,” Gallant told NOSH.

Chamberlain Coffee will build up its retail and wholesale presence, starting with traditional and natural grocery stores, with hopes of reaching 250 doors by the end of the year.

“We’ll use the latest funding round for [growth] as we think about the fi nancials. I think all D2C businesses right now are taking a look at how expensive it is to acquire new consumers [in the] D2C space with all the changes that are happening across every platform,” said Gallant.

According to LinkedIn, the brand is also looking to fi ll several roles, including Marketing Manager, Chief Marketing Offi cer and Chief of Staff while still running relatively lean in the face of potential future headwinds.

“In just the general economy [...] often the mistake companies start to make is raising money around hiring a lot of people. But we do have a couple of key roles we need to fi ll,” said Gallant. “[Chamberlain Coffee] is looking for someone that has worked with food and beverage brands to deliver an omnichannel experience.”

Recently, Chamberlain Coffee explored new opportunities in the RTD segment through partnerships with Swoon and Nutpods.

In May, Chamberlain Coffee and Swoon launched Matcha Lemonade, a LTO available exclusively online in 12 oz. cans. In June, Nutpods and Chamberlain released a cobranded variety pack featuring “Emma’s favorite fl avors” –unsweetened French Vanilla, unsweetened Caramel and sweetened Sweet Crème – for $14.95.

Gallant, who has a background in the RTD space, including stints at Aqua ViTea and Red Bull, told NOSH in May that the brand is “super excited” about its potential for a direct move into RTD products. However, said jump will not happen within the next year. Thus far, the brand has found its ‘sweet spot’ in single-serve products like sachets and will use the new capital to “develop new and innovative products to further its mission of being an innovator in the beverage space.” The brand has also seen success with its matcha powder, its strongest selling SKU, and recently added two new fl avor innovations – Vanilla and Mango – available online for $23 per 30g tin.

“To be able to grow this business, launch new products and work in this space every day is a dream come true. I am so thankful that we have been able to grow Chamberlain Coffee into the brand I dreamed it to be, and I can’t wait for what the future holds,” said Chamberlain in the release.

The company has spent the last 14 months largely focused on making operational improvements, including moving into a larger Pasadena-based production facility and bringing on new staff. With its infrastructure revamped, Jung said the company is now ready to change gears and look to the future.

“If the last 18 months were a super pared-down, less-is-more approach … I would say we’re now entering a new phase,” Jung said. “Part of raising the money was [to go on the] offensive, to start to do [more outbound efforts and collaborations] and some of it was defensive, given the economy and everything that’s going on in the world.”

Last year the company began to dabble with one-time offers; its Black Friday Member’s Only subscription, which includes a box of 24 cookies every two months for a year – plus early access to new flavors and a collectable box – sold out at $1,000 each. This Valentine’s Day, the bakery launched its first limited edition box and assortment, a model the company plans to replicate for other holidays.

Ahead of the release of its second cookie collection later this year, Last Crumb has also in recent months done limited test drops for new varieties, such as Florida Man, a key lime

Luxury Brand Last Crumb Closes $3M Round To ‘Go on the Offensive’ & Enter Brick & Mortar

Luxury cookie company Last Crumb has closed a $3 million seed round which will help the direct-to-consumer company fund marketing and R&D and move into an “offensive” position ahead of its next growth phase.

The seed round, announced in July, was led by Electric Feel Ventures, the venture capital arm of entertainment management company Electric Feel Entertainment, with Chetrit Ventures, hospitality entrepreneur David Grutman, fashion executive Andrew Rosen and Venus ET Fleur founders Seema Bansal and Sunny Chadha also taking part. The company previously raised $1 million last year, just a few months before it began selling product.

“We were able to bring in existing people who’ve been with us from that first fundraise who saw that we did what we said we were going to do over the last nine months,” CEO Mathew Jung said. “Then we were really strategic in bringing on some new people that we thought could be really interesting, both for future expansion and … [who] could help from an advisory standpoint, as we think about what the evolution of Last Crumb is.”

Last Crumb offers a single product: a 12-pack of smallbatch, ultra-premium hand-made cookies that retails for $140. With flavors including Better Than S*x (a play on chocolate chip), Netflix and Crunch (cinnamon sugar) and Not Today Mr. Muffin Man (blueberry), each 4.5 oz cookie is designed to be indulgent and shareable. Its signature cookie boxes are available to purchase for only a few hours every Monday, and routinely sell out within hours.

pie flavored cookie. These efforts, Jung said, are designed to further develop customer longevity and encourage repeat purchasing.

Having built a dedicated direct-to-consumer base, Jung said the company is approaching its retail launch cautiously. While collaborations with other brands or retailers have been considered, the current plan is to open luxury-oriented, Last Crumb-owned stores in the US at some point in the future, with Jung using Las Vegas as an example of a potential launch market in late 2023 or early 2024.

But neither reduced prices or a smaller pack size are on the docket, Jung said, as supply chain and production costs are only rising. Last Crumb’s core audience of high-income consumers are also seeing less financial impacts on their discretionary spending and aren’t asking for lower prices.

Jung hasn’t denied his interest in an eventual exit for Last Crumb, though he maintains that this may or may not mean an outright sale. While the past year has been about building the ops side of the business, the next is about growing sales and profitability, a goal he believes the company will hit in the next 90-160 days.

“While our goal, yes, has always been to be conservative with cash and to exit the business at some point. We also want to build a business … we aim to be profitable, we’re not trying to be a DTC loss leader,” Jung said.”We believe that we’re building something, regardless of selling it or keeping it or whatever, that will be here for a long, long time.”

Yumi Moves into Brick & Mortar to ‘Build a Healthier Generation’

E-commerce focused baby food brand Yumi is taking its fi rst step into brick-and-mortar retail through a national partnership with Target, the company announced in July.

The company had always planned to expand beyond digital sales into physical retail, according to Yumi co-founder, CMO and president Evelyn Rusli, but wanted to wait until it had more fully saturated the online market before making the jump. The wait also allowed the brand to test and iterate its core line of products, she added, as well as its value proposition.

Target is taking two lines: Superfood Veggie Organic Toddler Bars (MSRP $4.99) and Organic Meltable Puffs (MSRP $3.99). The former is available in Strawberry & Rhubarb, Blueberry & Purple Carrot, and Apple Cinnamon & Squash, while the latter comes in Apple & Broccoli, Strawberry Basil and Sweet Pea. Yumi will have dedicated 4-foot, in-aisle sets along with endcap displays in select Target stores.

“There’s so many different pathways to discover amazing products… so we always wanted to be where consumers are and where they can discover us,” Yumi co-founder, CMO and president Evelyn Rusli said. “Our mission is really to build a healthier generation and you don’t just build a healthier generation with a subset of the population [that’s online].”

To prepare for the expansion, Yumi raised $67 million last December, bringing its total funding close to $90 million since its inception in 2017. That capital helped fi nance new brokers as well as new sales and marketing team members.

Yumi’s packaging was also revised to better perform in a retail environment: Online, the products are displayed as single serve bars or cardboard tubes of puffs decorated with whimsical illustrations, Rusli said, but for Target, the brand is selling five-count boxes of bars and plastic tubes of puffs with callouts regarding functional benefits and superfood ingredients.

“When you’re looking at brick and mortar and you have an end cap or you have just a piece of packaging, you have to make that design work really hard for your brand,” Rusli said of the changes.

Yumi plans to add more accounts over the next year. Still, the growth will be deliberate, Rusli said, because the company understands launching with Target is a large undertaking itself.

Though the company is best known for its line of globallyinspired, refrigerated baby food cups, partnering with Target meant shifting its focus to on-the-go snacking, Rusli said, because it felt like a more approachable introduction to the brand for a mass audience. There also was a clearer point of differentiation, she added, because the toddler and kids snack category is so heavily saturated with sugar-ladened options. Baby food isn’t off the table completely, but will not be an immediate focus.

The pickup of Yumi comes as retailers are responding to consumer interest in baby and toddler food options with simpler and more nutrient-dense ingredient decks. While this demand mirrors larger health and wellness trends, recent investigations into the toxins and heavy metals found in other baby food brands has also ramped up awareness.

In July, Target also picked up clean-label baby formula brand Bobbie. Meanwhile, organic chilled baby and children’s food

brand Once Upon a Farm released its own line of frozen baby food meal starters to age up the brand and offer parents more complete meal solutions.

While Yumi may command a higher price point, like Bobbie, it also stresses transparency and community, making parents feel comfortable during an unsettling time.

“We are not just solving mealtime, we are helping parents feel confident in the food products that they feed their kids,” Rusli said. “But also helping parents feel like they got this and that they don’t have to worry. There’s actually a lot that you’re solving for psychologically and emotionally, for that parent and for that family.”

BREWSCAPE

THE LATEST CRAFT BEER BRAND NEWS

Night Shift Scales Back Production in Favor of Contract Brewing

Night Shift leadership told its 12 production employees work could dry up as early as late July, as the company prepares to wind down brewing and packaging operations at its Everett, Massachusetts location.

The company will shift to contract production at Framing ham-based Jack’s Abby Craft Lagers and Pawtucket, Rhode Island-based Isle Brewers Guild (IBG), which had been pro ducing about 50% of Night Shift’s volume.

“What we’ve told the production staff is like there might not be any work after today, but we are going to guarantee every body’s paycheck till October 1, so two months,” co-founder Rob Burns said. “Then, if they have to sit at home, that’s what’s going to happen. After that, we’re still unsure because we’re reacting to this news and we wanted to be transparent and forthcoming to the staff and give them as much notice as soon as we knew.”

If employees are still sidelined by October 1, the company will offer them severance packages, Burns said.

Burns and co-founder Mi chael Oxton pointed to supply chain disruptions of carbon di oxide (CO2) as a driving force behind the immediate produc tion pivot to other locations.

“CO2 is definitely a catalyst for this, or maybe the final straw in a lot of ways,” Burns said.

Since finding out in mid-July that its supply was about to be cut, Night Shift has called several other suppliers, only to be told that there is no CO2 available for purchase.

CO2 is used to move beer throughout the production process, to package it into cans and bottles and to push it through draft lines for taproom service. The beer industry dealt with a short age during Summer 2020, when production of CO2 – often a byproduct of ethanol production – plummeted along with de mand for gasoline.

This time, disruptions to other CO2 streams are causing the problem. Ammonia plants, which aid in fertilizer production and also give off CO2 to be captured, have been offline for offseason maintenance, according to Gasworld, which predicted a “long, hot summer ahead” for the U.S. CO2 market. In ad dition to that, a CO2 well in Mississippi is contaminated, Gas world reported.

CO2 aside, Night Shift has struggled to mold the Everett loca tion to meet its needs as a craft beer and hard seltzer producer, and has relied on off-site production.

“It’s been a problem-solving effort since we moved in, but really over the last three years investing dollars and ideas and

schedules and all sorts of shifts to just like ‘How do we make this work?’ so that it’s optimized and it’s still not,” Oxton said.

The Everett brewery is “in a dense urban environment with limited land and small ceiling heights, and it is not designed to match the scale,” Burns said. Night Shift has expanded the fa cility several times since it opened in 2012. In the decade since, both Night Shift’s business and the craft beer industry have evolved at a near-breakneck pace.

“When we signed a lease here, we had brewed about 500 bar rels of beer,” Burns said. “Nearly all of our beer went to 750 mL cork-and-cage or capped bottles. It was a different industry and we had a different product we were making, and now the No. 1 thing we sell is 12-packs.”

For the past few years, about half of Night Shift’s volume has been produced at other loca tions, and the Everett brewery is on pace to produce 22,00025,000 barrels this year – a lot of volume to make in less-thanideal conditions, Burns said.

“We have known for a long time that the Everett facility is not optimized as a major craft beer production plant,” he said. “Our plan to solve that was to build the Philadelphia brewery, and once that plan got canceled in spring of 2020 you could say that was the start of this snowball.

“We still, despite that, continue to spend money to make Ever ett more successful,” he continued. “We’ve spent $10 million in the production space since 2019 to try to increase the efficiencies and make it more capable for the scale production but despite all that, we’re just not able to get there.”

The Philadelphia brewery, announced in August 2019, would have provided 30,000 barrels of capacity immediately, with the ability to scale to 200,000 barrels over time. But the tumult the COVID-19 pandemic wrought upon the beer industry made the plan too risky, and Night Shift abandoned the plan in May 2020. Once the Philadelphia brewery was off the table, Night Shift signed a contract with Jack’s Abby to help with production.

In 2020, Night Shift’s volume only declined -2%, a loss that was recouped threefold with a +6% increase in 2021, according to the May/June issue of the Brewers Association’s (BA) New Brewer. Last year, Night Shift produced 38,840 barrels of beer, excluding its Hoot Hard Seltzer.

The company took a margin hit last September, when Night Shift Distributing shut down and Night Shift sold the rights to distribute its products in Massachusetts and Connecticut to Sheehan Family Companies.

BREWSCAPE

Monster Reveals Plans for 6% ABV FMB Beast Unleashed

Monster Beverage Company confi rmed its long-rumored entrance into beverage alcohol during its Q2 2022 earnings call, announcing that Monster Beast Unleashed, a four-SKU line of fl avored malt beverages (6% ABV) will launch in late Q4 2022 with the goal of being nationally distributed by the end of 2023. It will be the energy drink maker’s fi rst major alcoholic beverage launch since acquiring the CANarchy Craft Brewery Collective in early 2022.

Beast Unleashed will come in a 16 oz. single-serve can, as well as a 12-can variety pack in 12 oz. cans. The four fl avors will be

based on some of the brand’s “most well-known and popular fl avors,” Monster CEO and chairman Rodney Sacks said during the call.

“Beast Unleashed will leverage Monster’s brand equity while carving out its own unique space in the beverage-alcohol sector, and will be distinguishable from the many hot seltzer brands that have become so ubiquitous over the last several years.”

Sacks said the company’s alcohol innovation pipeline is “robust with a number of additional innovative product lines currently under development.”

Allagash Adds First IPA ‘Hop Reach’ to Year-Round Lineup

Allagash Brewing Company has resisted the urge to add an IPA trend for quite some time – at least within its core lineup – with growth driven by the success of its fl agship Allagash White Belgianstyle witbier. But next year, the Portland, Maine-based brewery is getting hoppy with the addition of Hop Reach IPA to its year-round offerings.

Hop Reach IPA – a 6.8% ABV “balanced, citrusy and tropical IPA, with a snap of bitterness,” – was developed over seven months by Allagash’s pilot team, and received more than 400 employee reviews. The offering is meant to be a “classic, timeless beer,” for both IPA lovers and consumers familiar with the Allagash brand.

Hop Reach will begin rolling out in January, with Allagash’s full footprint covered by mid-March, in time for spring retail resets. The IPA will be available in 16 oz. 4-packs, 12 oz. 6-packs and 12 oz. 12-packs of cans, varying by territory, as well as draft.

“We’ve designed it to complement Allagash White,” Naomi Neville, Allagash director of sales, said during a virtual tasting event with media members. “Allagash White is still by far our fl agship beer, It’s the beer that we started our business …this beer isn’t designed to take any focus or emphasis off the Allagash White brand. This is to sit next to it, to complement it, [and] give us a strong second brand in a very approachable style that a lot of people are familiar with.”

Allagash White is up +9% year-todate in IRI-tracked channels, with draft

up +27%, Neville said. In 2019, Allagash increased off-premise accounts for the brand by +35%, and increased “off-premise effective placements” by +74% compared to 2019, founder Rob Tod said in a November press briefi ng.

Allagash decided to add an IPA to its core lineup partially due to wholesalers asking for an IPA offering “for years,” Neville said. Last year, Allagash released Swiftly IPA as its spring seasonal, however, IPA remained a year-round gap in the company’s portfolio. A year later, Allagash expects Hop Reach to fi ll that gap and become the company’s No. 2 offering after Allagash White, passing Tripel, a Belgian-style golden ale.

“It is pretty much the first question you get when people walk up is ‘What’s your hoppiest beer?’ or ‘Do you have an IPA?’” Neville said. “Finally we will be able to say ‘Yes, we’ve got this beer right here.’”

IPA is the best-selling style in the craft beer segment, accounting for 45.1% of all craft dollars at off-premise chain retailers year-to-date through July 10, according to IRI. In that period, IPA has earned $1.13 billion. Although the style’s dollar sales have declined -4.3% compared to last year, its dollar share has increased +1.3%, far more than any other style in the segment. The next largest craft style is, coincidentally, Belgian wits.

Hop Reach is not a hazy IPA, despite the subsegment driving IPA sales in IRI-tracked channels. The decision was made to prioritize aroma and fl avor over appearance, as Allagash made sure to make an IPA entrant that was still inherently an “Allagash beer,” Allagash brewmaster Jason Perkins said.

“It’s based on not blindly ignoring what’s happening in the trade, but very much based on things that we want to do,” Perkins said. “We wanted to make a beer that we hope resonated for many years to come. Something you could see yourself drinking a few years from now.

“We’ve never been trend followers per-se here,” he continued. “This was no exception. We were focused on trying to make the best beer we could, and not necessarily following what trend was out there.”

Ball to Close 2 Can Manufacturing Plants; Delays Construction of a 3rd

Ball Corp. plans to permanently close can manufacturing facilities in Phoenix, Arizona, and St. Paul, Minnesota, and delay construction of a new plant in North Las Vegas, Nevada, the Westminster, Colorado-headquartered company announced during its second quarter fi nancial results.

Ball, the world’s largest manufacturer of can packaging, said the plans to cease operations at the two facilities and delay building a third were “in response to the deceleration in customer demand late in the second quarter” and “to address localized supply-demand imbalances.”

The company did not indicate how many employees would be affected by the closures.

According to Ball president and CEO Daniel Fisher, the two landlocked, three-line facilities were built in the late 1960s and mid-1970s and had a net capacity of about 4 billion units.

Ball CFO Scott Morrison indicated that one of the facilities will likely close in the back half of 2022, while the other would close “early next year.”

Ball operates 15 other can manufacturing and can end production plants in the U.S., according to its website. The move to shutter two facilities follows actions taken by the company to rightsize its customer base by increasing the order quantity for printed cans to 1 million per SKU.

Ball leaders seemed to put the decision to close the plants at the feet of its customers, who they said have taken price increases over the last year in excess of infl ationary cost pressures. Fisher said the pricing behavior of its customers has occurred each quarter over the last four quarters, with its customers raising prices by 7% on average.

“So you’re getting to a point now where year over year, you’re looking at 20%, almost 30% price increases in some of these products,” Fisher said. “That absolutely has an impact on discretionary and consumer buying. And we’re looking at that and we’re making adjustments, we’re optimizing our footprint. This

is a near-term balance for us.”

Fisher highlighted that total alcohol was down -3% in the second quarter, “mostly driven by domestic beer.” Non-alcoholic beverages were “a bit more resilient,” he said, with carbonated soft drinks and energy drinks growing and total non-alc beverages up +1%.

Morrison said Ball was “building inventories for what we thought would be a more robust season here in North America that didn’t show up.”

Fisher, in his prepared remarks, stressed that “cans continue to win in the fastest growing beverage categories and underlying demand for aluminum packaging continues to be resilient, despite retail shelf price increases by our customers ranging as high as 20%.”

“Early indications are that North American customers will continue to emphasize price over volume during the second half of 2022,” he added.

Fisher called on Ball’s customers “to return to a semblance of pricing strategy, which they’ve implied and implored over decades,” instead of “pushing forth price in excess of infl ationary costs” and “margining on that.”

“If there’s a modicum of return to a different pricing strategy, we will benefit from that in terms of an uptick in volume in North America,” he added.

Decisions by Ball’s customers to increase price has led the company to back away from double-digit growth projections in North America, Fisher added. In spite of “economic challenges” this year, he said Ball globally would deliver 5% growth in 2022.

Asked about the North American can market which had been sold out, Fisher said “a confluence of events” are happening and in the near term, “there could be slack capacity for the near term” due to Ball ramping up “large asset bases” in Pittston, Pennsylvania, and Glendale, Arizona, and investments in canning lines that have increased efficiency.

Judge Affirms $56 Million Jury Verdict in Stone

Brewing Trademark Infringement Case

A federal judge has denied Molson Coors’ attempt to toss a $56 million jury award to Stone Brewing in the San Diego craft brewery’s trademark infringement lawsuit over the 2017 refresh of Keystone Light packaging.

Judge Roger T. Benitez wrote that although he disagreed with several of the jury’s fi ndings, he would “not second guess” their March 25 decision. As such, Benitez denied Molson Coors’ motions for judgment as a matter of law, affi rmative defenses and declaratory judgments.

Throughout his order, Benitez made a point of agreeing with several of Molson Coors’ positions. Nevertheless, he concluded that “this court’s disagreement with the jury’s ultimate conclusion cannot give rise to a judgment as a matter of law against Stone.”

“Here, because the jury’s verdict is supported by evidence on the record, the Court fi nds it to be reasonable,” he added in denying Molson Coors’ motion for judgment as a matter of law.

Although the judge noted that Molson

Coors’ attorney “presented strong evidence,” including “testimony that showed the structural fl aws” of Stone’s surveys, Benitez wrote that the jury found the survey evidence “convincing enough to fi nd a likelihood of confusion.”

“The court will not second guess this determination,” he wrote.

ENERGY

Organic Boost has officially splashed into the energy drink category. Available in four flavors –Citrus, Cherry Cola, Wild Berry and Cranberry Lime – the organic energy drink packs 125mg of caffeine per 12 oz. can. Organic Boost’s line of energy drinks will soon be available for purchase exclusively online. For more information, visit drinkorganicboost.com.

In conjunction with its new Mind, Body and Soul FUEL redesign, Angry Angel rolled out three new fl avors: Strawberry Kiwi, Peach Ginger and Popsicle Blast. The packaging redesign was intended to better communicate the beverage’s number one goal of enhancing “the body’s natural functions and systems without using artificial ingredients.” For more information, call (704) 360-0808.

ZOA Energy has expanded its line of zero sugar functional beverages with its new limited-edition flavor, Cherry Limeade. The new release marks the brand’s third flavor expansion this year, following Tropical Punch and White Peach. For more information, visit zoaenergy.com.

CANNABIS DRINKS

Green Concepts, Inc. announced the launch of its Happy Mellow immune support CBD beverage. Each 20 oz. bottle contains 20mg of CBD and also features Vitamin C, Vitamin B-12 and Vitamin D-3. The three fl avors at launch include Plum Punch, Lemon Lime and Orange Acai. The Happy Mellow drinks are available online for $29.99 per 6-pack. For more information, call (844) 889-2837.

Harmonic Woman CBD has made its debut in the beverage set with two products: Rosé CBD Spirit and Rise. Rise contains 25mg of water-bonded CBD and 2.5mg THC while Rosé contains 25mg of water-bonded CBD and 10mg of THC. For more information, call (503) 828-1766.

SPARKLING

California-based sparkling water brand Aura Bora unveiled its newest limited edition flavor:

Blueberry Wildflower. The drink is crafted with wild blueberries and chamomile “to taste just like a sweet summer day in Yosemite valley,” the brand said in a press release. Twenty percent of all profits from the LTO will be donated to the Yosemite Conservancy. For more information, contact hello@aurabora.com.

Jay Shetty and Radhi Devlukia-Shetty launched JOYO, a new line of adaptogenic sparkling teas. Available in five flavors – Unsweetened Black Tea, Raspberry Black Tea, Black Tea with Lemon, Peach Black Tea and Tropical Green Tea – the tea is made with ayurvedic ingredients and a blend of adaptogens. JOYO’s sparkling teas are available at Erewhon for $3.49 per 12 oz. can. For more information, visit joyotea.com.

DRAM added two new flavors to its line of herbal sparkling waters: Mushroom Cola and Holy Basil & Lemon. The former contains a blend of four organic adaptogenic mushrooms; cordyceps, chaga, reishi and shiitake while the latter features passionflower and holy basil (tulsi). Both drinks are available online for $25 per 12-pack of 12 oz. cans. For more information, visit dramapothecary.com.

COFFEE

Harmless Harvest made its official debut in the coffee and tea category with two new products: Single Origin Coffee with Organic Coconut Water and Yerba Mate with Organic Coconut Water. Both products are available at select Whole Foods Market stores nationwide for $3.99 per 10 oz. bottle. For more information, visit harmlessharvest.com

Better-for-you health and wellness brand Alani Nu launched expanded its portfolio with a new beverage line: Alani Coffee. Available in four varieties – Cappuccino, Vanilla, Maple Donut and Mocha – each 12 oz. bottle delivers 10g of protein. For more information, visit alaninu.com.

ALT DAIRY

Coffee Mate added two more non-dairy options to its lineup of creamers: Plant-Based Almond & Oat French Vanilla and Plant-Based Almond & Oat Caramel. Both plant-based creamers are available in-store for a SRP of $4.29 per 32 oz. bottle. For more information, call 1 (800) 225-2270.

NEW PRODUCTS

Califia Farms is another brand celebrating the fall season with the launch of Pumpkin Spice Oat Barista. The new offering combines the brand’s signature oat milk with spices like cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. It is designed to be steamed, frothed and added to espresso drinks. For more information, visit califiafarms.com.

CSDs

Coca-Cola unveiled its fi nal Coca-Cola Creations drop of 2022: Coca-Cola Dreamworld. According to a press release, the newest fl avor innovation “adds playfully vibrant fl avor notes that evoke the boundless creativity of the human imagination to the unmistakable taste of Coca-Cola.”. The new soda is available in full sugar and Zero Sugar varieties. For more information, call 1 (800) 438-2653.

RTD Cocktails

Mississippi’s oldest legal distillery, Cathead Distillery, launched a new line of RTD sparkling vodka sodas: Cathead Sparkling Sunsetters. Available in four fl avors – Raspberry, Mango, Ginger Pineapple and Cucumber Mint – each 12 oz. slim can (5% ABV) has just 97 calories. For more information, call (601) 667-3038.

Reed’s splashed into the RTD cocktail category with its Hard Ginger Ale. Available in four varieties – Mango, Pineapple Coconut, Cherry Lime and Watermelon Strawberry – each 12 oz. can contains 5% ABV and 100 calories.

The variety 8-pack featuring all four fl avors is available at retailers nationwide. For more information, call 1 (800) 997-3337.

OTR Cocktails added a new, permanent portfolio addition: Espresso Martini. The ready-to-serve drink is made with dark espresso coffee liquor and Effen Vodka, matching “flavors of bold roasted espresso with dark chocolate tasting notes and vanilla undertones,” according to the brand. For more information, call (312) 871-4991.

SPIRITS

Rye whiskey maker WhistlePig teamed up with Traeger Grills to create its newest product innovation: SmokeStock Wood Fired

Whiskey. The limited-edition offering is aged in American Oak No. 3 char barrels and then smoked with Traeger’s Apple BBQ Wood to impart “campfi re smoke and subtle savory notes,” according to WhistlePig’s site. WhistlePig SmokeStock Wood Fired Whiskey (86 proof, 43% ABV) is available online for $72.99 per 750ml bottle. For more information, visit whistlepigwhiskey.com.

Veteran-owned whiskey brand Hotel Tango Distillery launched ‘Shmallow Toasted Marshmallow Bourbon, which pays homage to the classic campfi re treat. According to a press release, the new drink contains nostalgic fl avor notes of caramelized sugar and smoke. ‘Shmallow (60 Proof, 30% ABV) is available online and at select retailers nationwide for $24.99 per 750ml bottle. For more information, visit hoteltangodistillery.com.

The Balvenie unveiled the latest addition to its Cask Finishes Range: The Balvenie Oak 16-Year-Old. The new offering marks the latest permanent addition to the range since the debut of Caribbean Cask 14-YearOld in 2013. The Balvenie Oak 16-Year-Old (47.6% ABV) is a single malt fi nished in casks that previously housed Pineau wine from the French Charentes vineyards, according to the brand. The whiskey is available at retailers nationwide for a SRP of $174.99 per 750ml bottle. For more information, visit thebalvenie.com.

POWDERS

Sneak Energy is adding some zest with its new Breakfast Orange Bundle. The bundle includes a 400 gram jar of Breakfast Orange energy powder, a plastic shaker and SneakO’s cereal. The new cereal features mixed fruit and honey fl avors. Sneak Energy Breakfast Orange Bundle is available exclusively online for $49.95. For more information, visit sneakenergy.com.

Energy and supplement brand GHOST launched GHOST Gamer and GHOST BCAA in Sour Patch Kids Pineapple fl avor. The former boasts 150mg of caffeine per two scoop serving while the latter delivers 7 grams of vegan fermented 2:1:1 BCAAs. For more information, visit ghostlifestyle.com.

Can the new ownership of Bolthouse and Evolution Fresh juices revive the doldrums-mired Smoothie category? After three years of ownership by PE fi rm Butterfl y Equity, it looks like Bolthouse is on an upward trajectory, while foundational brand Naked continues to plod from a leadership position. Meanwhile, lots of entrepreneurial brands are starting to chart here, from Koia to Suja to a reformulated Harmless Harvest. Also making noise: squeeze-pack brand Once Upon A Farm.

JUICE AND DRINK SMOOTHIES

BRAND

Naked $594,810,060

Bolthouse

Once

$234,162,286 18.5%

$27,383,518 -22.3%

A Farm $16,281,799 62.1%

Evolution $15,897,123 42.3%

Private Label $12,810,728 -41.2%

Stonyfield Organic $8,485,990 32.5%

Dannon $7,220,899 105.0%

Suja $6,115,109 48.1%

Koia $3,914,940 454.3%

Harmless Harvest $1,979,003 601.1%

Ardens Garden $1,749,180 5.5%

Genius $706,043 -33.0%

Pressed Juicery $410,047

Columbia Gorge $253,976 8.8%

Kelloggs $108,762 -41.0%

Odwalla $108,177 -86.6%

Yoplait $79,744 -16.1%

Karuna $76,871 132.6%

Forager Project $4,227

CHANNEL CHECK

BOTTLED STILL WATER

BRAND DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs. YEAR EARLIER

Private Label $4,579,875,240 24.6%

Aquafina $1,295,774,110 12.9%

Glaceau $1,083,076,048 12.8%

Dasani $995,181,459 3.2%

Poland Spring $864,613,825 14.7%

Pure Life $745,066,427 -0.9%

Deer Park $534,605,452 20.6%

Fiji $513,465,502 2.8%

Essentia $488,773,118 35.3%

Ozarka $451,005,983 17.2%

RFG KOMBUCHA

BRAND DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs. YEAR EARLIER

GTS $303,111,729 5.8%

Health Ade Kombucha $103,637,073 26.8%

Kevita $69,426,814 -9.8%

Brew Dr Kombucha $32,726,282 3.0%

Private Label $29,316,250 2.4%

Humm $19,369,990 2.2%

Live $5,097,918 20.7%

Aqua Vitea Kombucha $4,871,671 3.1%

Mother Kombucha $2,845,305 22.7%

Buddhas Brew Kombucha $2,624,205 -20.1%

NONFLAVORED SELTZER/SPARKLING/MINERAL

BRAND

DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs. YEAR EARLIER

Perrier $196,633,908 15.9%

Sanpellegrino $188,130,289 4.8%

Topo Chico $177,213,391 -13.6%

Private Label $70,706,576 4.0%

La Croix $39,004,647 9.9%

Polar $35,680,710 29.7%

Jarritos $24,808,818 25.9%

Liquid Death

$15,354,065 333.1%

Canada Dry $13,458,554 -6.9%

Schweppes $11,770,379 -15.9%

RFG READY-TO-DRINK COFFEE

BRAND

DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs. YEAR EARLIER

Starbucks $384,581,595 17.4%

Stok $206,368,152 34.2%

Intl Delight $172,358,228 36.1%

Califia Farms $60,713,937 32.6%

Coca Cola $44,548,825 44.8%

Bolthouse Farms $22,333,075 27.5%

Private Label $16,935,542 18.9%

La Colombe $15,595,668 53.2%

Bizzy $10,139,322 264.8%

Chameleon $9,141,669 20.1%

SOURCE: IRI, a Chicago-based market research firm-@iriworldwide% 52 Weeks through 8/07/22

BRAND

Red

ENERGY DRINKS

$6,896,444,032

$5,083,059,446

VPX $1,264,391,764

Rockstar $704,593,833

Celsius $581,021,755

Reign $430,850,525

SPORTS DRINKS

BRAND DOLLAR

Gatorade

$6,533,979,250

Bodyarmor $1,655,887,101

Powerade $1,241,160,306

Electrolit $337,244,561

Private Label $66,927,640 54.3%

Prime $37,638,650

Biolyte $36,064,065 75.8%

Pedialyte $31,271,633

Suerox $7,838,516

VPX $5,574,086

BRAND

DOMESTIC BEER

DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs. YEAR EARLIER

Bud $6,510,541,504 -6.8%

Michelob $3,441,703,007 5.3%

Coors

Miller Lite

Busch

$2,619,862,525 -2.1%

$2,110,949,028 -3.6%

$1,759,476,108 1.3%

Natural $1,316,340,448 -5.4%

Bud Specialty

Miller High Life

Yuengling

$601,765,040 -18.8%

$394,713,348 -6.3%

$393,607,541 9.6%

New Belgium $392,215,612 15.7%

IMPORT BEER

BRAND

Modelo

DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs. YEAR EARLIER

$3,713,253,863 13.4%

Corona $2,877,701,107 -7.2%

Heineken

$858,313,944 -3.2%

Dos Equis XX $445,239,963 -4.0%

Stella Artois

$413,653,940 -12.4%

Pacifico $230,598,336 -9.4%

Guinness $172,394,396 -2.4%

Labatt $144,319,455 -7.2%

Tecate $132,075,150 -15.4%

Fosters $79,131,264 -11.6%

GERRY’S INSIGHTS

BY GERRY KHERMOUCH

The Simplicity Strategy

Seen those Spectrum Mobile ads with the “$29.99!” guy? At least in my neck of the woods, they’re airing with such frequency as to seriously stress-test the wear-out factor even of well-cast ads with clever copywriting. (Though in a period of hyper-infl ation I wonder, do you really want to surgically implant the notion of $29.99 service in the occipital nodes of millions of viewers?) Still, I liked a recent execution that riffs on the complexity of our daily routines, where the $29.99 guy visits a café and tries to order a coffee, only to be bombarded by choices. So he switches his order to water. “Still, sparkling, babbling brook …?” the waiter asks.

Ah, the tyranny of choice. Some economists say there can’t be such a thing as too many choices, but some interesting experiments at retail have suggested that shoppers at a sampling table, say, will buy less if the array of flavors gets to bewildering proportions. By and large, though, we seem to be heading to a place where the imperative of CPG marketers is to get to a point where they can customize their products to a market of one. You. And you can decide whether that represents greater simplicity or complexity.

Is there a countertrend unfolding to this? In beverages lately we’re seeing the arrival of a flock of new and restaged brands that are of the utmost simplicity, be it in their ingredient lists, package graphics, their names, their core premise. In my New York base, the retro-sounding Brooklyn Best seems to be making a splash with straightforward teas and lemonades in conventional 12-ounce cans, for instance. It’s barely in the market, but storekeepers I ask say consumers spot it and buy it. Also around New York, a non-alcoholic beer called Al’s has been popping up that dispenses even with identifying a style like lager or pale ale. Classic “near beer” is all it has to say. Some more established brands with momentum would fit that premise too, along the lines of Calypso Lemonade, Joe Tea and Milo’s Sweet Tea. I’ve long had a soft spot for brands like Boylan’s that offer a straightforward proposition in a clean, uncluttered package. The entire category of fl avored sparkling waters like La Croix would by defi nition fit in here too. Enough so that some restaging brands like Sound Sparkling Tea have found it expedient to become Sound Sparkling Water.

How real is this trend? Who knows? In the early days it can be hard to tease out sustainable trends from the unending stream of thousands of new items headed to retail. If this is indeed a trend, it may be drawing support from several factors.

At the consumer level, there may be enough shoppers who, like the $29.99 guy, would like their beverage choices to represent a respite from, not an intensification of, the complexities entangling the rest of their lives in areas like – well, cell phone service, for one. This impetus may well have been reinforced by the pandemic-era triage that left consumers confronting a narrower set of choices, often just staples, at the shelf. Shoppers may have decided they’re OK with that. There can be a kind of anti-badging statement involved too, kind of in the way that PBR and Narragansett beers offer younger drinkers a rejection of boomers’ persnickety craft preferences. There’s that retro appeal. And this all nests neatly with the vogue for short, understandable ingredient lists.

From a business perspective, we all seem to be learning from some of the excesses of the past where entrepreneurs conjured groundbreaking beverages that, if they lasted long enough to fi nd

an exit, ended up dumbed down as the only way to attain sustainable scale. From a production standpoint, at a time of supply chain stresses, why not just procure a handful of straightforward ingredients and employ processing techniques that are in relative abundance, like hot-fi ll? Lately, too, entrepreneurs are learning to have a ready answer to queries about how big the TAM (total addressable market) is for their concept. That’s a way for investors to gauge the potential upside. Working to become a leader in a modest-size category (like kombucha, or maybe mushroom coffee or nutropics) no longer is as appealing to investors as playing in a massive category where success can yield a billion-dollar brand. So the gut-pop makers can argue with a straight face that their TAM is no less than the multi-billion-dollar CSD space. That’s a compelling enough argument that most of the kombucha marketers themselves are avidly plying their own gut pop offerings.

Then there’s marketing. A lot of us have learned the hard way that it’s hard enough to educate the consumer on one novel element of a new brand, let alone a half dozen. So, while I happen to be a fan of those mushroom coffees that have been coming down the pike, it’s a challenge to try to explain an entirely new segment using ingredients like reishi and lion’s mane shrooms that may be alien to many consumers. (Some of them have CBD as a component too!) If your package represents your main vehicle to tell your story in a couple of seconds on the shelf, that’s a difficult burden. As a rule of thumb, I’d suggest that if you’re having a lot of trouble settling on the right hierarchy of messages on your package, that could mean there are too many messages to begin with.

Likely the most compelling case history that bears out this thinking is Body Armor. It started as a “super drink” with dozens of arcane ingredients that were expensive to procure, unpleasant to the palate and difficult to explain. It attained success as a stripped down isotonic that has ignited a burst of premium growth in a category locked up by two highly promotional players. Others are following a similar playbook. Take L.A. Libations, which has participated in its share of abstruse new products at the bleeding edge. Lately it’s been trying a different strategy of focusing on established brands in established categories that are susceptible to disruption with a cleaner, lower-sugar version that’s in synch with the trajectory of the consumer. After its Arriba brand didn’t work out as a Latino-focused energy drink, L.A. Libations repurposed it to offer a clean version of Clamato called Chelada (no artificials, including MSG) and a clean version of Jarritos Mexican soda called Fresquitas. Those entries need little explanation and could be worth a home on the beer trucks of its partner, Molson Coors, sooner rather than later.

There are some conundrums I can’t figure out yet. For instance, if your brand is the essence of simplicity, does that mean the strategics will be less likely to want to buy it? After all, their thinking may go, how hard can it be to just knock it off themselves? Dunno. Still, I find this trend – if it really rates as a trend – to be refreshing. It’s a little bit like when the punk rock bands came along to do a reset on a rock & roll genre that had become bloated and pretentious. Will some of these new brands prove to be the Ramones or Clash of beverages? Even the ones that burn out early could have a lasting impact.

Longtime beverage-watcher

Gerry Khermouch is executive editor of Beverage Business Insights, a twice-weekly e-newsletter covering the nonalcoholic beverage sector.

SHOW

WHAT

Store

of

Vegas

Center

October 1-4,

Sat-Mon:

-

-

ALPHABETICAL EXHIBITOR LIST

Exhibitor Booth

28 BLACK Energy Drinks 28 BLACK 4092

5-hour ENERGY 1762

AAA Beverage Company AAA Beverage - Body iQ 3381

Agua Bonita 3578

Anheuser-Busch 1229

Bang Energy Vital Pharmaceuticals 4271

Beam Suntory 536

BeatBox Beverages 233

BioSteel Sports 1373

BlueTriton Brands 3392, 629

BODYARMOR 4259

brooklyn bottling 245 Buzzballz, LLC BuzzBallz/Southern Champion 277

C4® 4227

Calypso Lemonades 255

CANarchy Craft Brewery 877 CBD Living 3396 Celsius 1137

CForce Bottling Company 3647

Congo Brands 453

Constellation Brands 1562

Country Time Lemonade LLC 328

Crystal Geyser Alpine Spring 540

Danone North America Away From Home 5726

DAS Labs LLC Bucked Up 439

Deville Beverage Co. 3468

Diageo Beer Company 145

E. & J. Gallo Winery 737

Electrolit USA - CAB Enterprises Inc. 1129

Ellis Isle, Inc. 3390

Eternal Beverages LLC Eternal Water 1750

Exhibitor Booth

Factory LLC 3894

Factory LLC 3892

FIFCO USA 2419

FIJI Water 2849

Fire Brands 3492

Founders Brewing Company 149

Geloso Beverage Group 139

Golden Fleece Beverages, Inc Argo Tea 4680

good2grow 4127

Guayaki Yerba Mate 3395

Health-Ade 4460

Hillbilly Beverages LLC 126

Hint, Inc. 4585

HUMANITEA Company 4468

Icelandic Glacial 3249

Inotea 3484

Jelly Belly Candy Company 3625

Joe Tea & Chips 330

Jones Soda Co 3636

Karma Culture, LLC. Karma Water 154

Keurig Dr Pepper 3826, 1528

King’s Hawaiian Bakery, Inc. 4865

Kitu Life Super Coffee / Anheuser-Busch 355

Koia 3574

Lemon Perfect 3590

Liquid Death Mountain Water 1879

Liquid I.V. 3372

Mark Anthony Brands 2949

Merica Energy

Molson Coors Beverage Company

Energy Company 2029, 3147

Exhibitor Booth

More Labs 420

Mpact Beverage Company 5669

Nestle USA 1849

Nirvana Water Sciences 4583

Nocarbs Company Nocco 320

ONE87 Wine And Cocktails BOMZZ Wine Cocktails 375

ONNIT ONNIT Labs, Inc. 3393

Pabst Brewing Company 2045

PepsiCo, Inc. 2629

Pocas International Corp. 475

Polar Beverages 1077

Premium Waters, Inc. Water Joe 4456

Proud Source Water 3476

PSR BRANDS 2351

Rambler Sparkling Water 3384

Red Bull North America 1246

Remedy Organics 437

Revolution Tea 4948

Rhino Rush Energy Rush Bev Co 3867

RISE Brewing Co. 474

Exhibitor Booth

Sazerac Company, Inc. 1963

Solari Brands Hipshots Energy and Sleep Shots 3491

Som Friends, Inc. Som Sleep 3583

Spindrift Beverage Co 4386

Splash Beverage Group 146

Sprecher Brewing Co. LLC 3891

Stewart’s Enterprise Holdings Inc. 1863

Stratus Group, Perfect Hydration, Koe Kombucha 4471

Surprise Drinks USA 331

TWEAKER ENERGY DRINK 4187

Uncle Matt’s Organic 3398

UPTIME Energy 829

VitaNourish 3371

WaterCo LLC 3479

WIS-PAK 3253

Wyld CBD 3571

Xtasy Energy 3485

ZenWTR Alkaline Water 4293

ZOA Energy / MolsonCoors 1739

STRANGE JOURNEY

FOR JUICE BRANDS DISEASE HURTS SUPPLY, BUT COVID RAISES DEMAND

BY BRAD AVERY

In the throes of pandemic lockdowns and concern over personal health, juice sales – which had been slumping amid the broad consumer rejection of sugar – saw a significant resurgence as demand for immunity and wellness beverages led a return back towards traditional fridge staples like Orange Juice.

Now, a little over two years later, consumers are returning to pre-pandemic routines. Although juice sales may not compare to the 2020 boom, they remain elevated, and health and wellness continue to be top consumer concerns.

Data fi rm IRI reported that refrigerated juice sales in MULO plus convenience were up 4.8% to $7.8 billion in the 52-weeks ending June 12. Within

that space, orange juice – which makes up around $3.3 billion on its own – grew 1.4%. Top brand Tropicana (sold last year to private equity fi rm PAI Partners) saw sales decline -8.2%. Comparatively, shelf-stable bottled juice was up 5% to $8.1 billion, aseptic juices grew 14.8% to $1.7 billion and canned juices were down -1.6% to $1.3 billion.

But the category has also been impacted heavily by supply shortages – not only due to labor and shipping complications, but also because of a citrus greening epidemic that began long before the pandemic and has been exacerbated by worsening climate change. As well, while pandemic-era functional trends like immunity and focus are continuing to hold, there’s still the question of how long they’ll continue to fuel category expansion.

The Green(ing) Monster

While the pandemic impacted supply chains across all consumer goods sectors, juice – in particular orange juice – has also had to reckon with worsening citrus agriculture. According to an April 2022 report by Rabobank, the global orange juice market is experiencing its lowest inventory levels in fi ve years, with “diminishing output from Brazil and Florida impacted supply and demand in developed markets.” In both regions, citrus greening has plagued orange trees while unexpected frosts have further devastated crops. The report noted that Florida was on track to produce a record small crop for the 2021-22 season, producing around 41.2 million boxes – down from 52.8 million the year before. Currently, Mexico has served as a lone “bright spot” providing consistent supply.

Brands and consumers are still feeling the impacts of supply disruption in different ways. Florida’s Natural, a co-op owned brand which for decades has marketed its orange juice as being locally sourced and “not from concentrate,” began sourcing concentrate from Mexico earlier this year and reformulated its fl agship drink to be a blended product. An updated label explained the change, noting that the co-op’s harvests are now 70% lower than a decade prior and declaring the harsh truth that “There’s just not enough juice in Florida.” Despite the shift, the brand is still performing; according to IRI, Florida’s Natural’s refrigerated juice sales were up 8.2% year-over-year and its shelf-stable orange juices grew 82.8%.

With Diageo Onboard, RTD Coconut Water Cocktails On the Rise

The founders of Sunboy, a spiked sparkling coconut water, initially got together slanging fresh coconuts at events and parties in New York. The two hosted parties on the Brooklyn Bridge selling coconuts from a bicycle, eventually growing the enterprise to offer the experience at food and corporate events. But when the pandemic put those events and that hustle to a stop, Luke McKenna and Yair Tygiel were forced to come up with another product: a hard coconut water.

Launched In 2021, Sunboy is not the only hard coconut water or ready-to-drink coconut water cocktail on the market; brands like Osena, CocoVodka/CocoRum, and 100 Coconuts have also launched different versions in the past couple of years. And now, the leading coconut water

The Rabobank report suggested that there are some positive early signs for the 2022-23 growing season, particularly in Brazil where more favorable weather patterns bode well for orange production. Nevertheless, a recovery for Florida “continues to be an uphill battle” due to rising costs.

Matt McLean, founder and CEO of Florida-based Uncle Matt’s Organic, said the supply issues in Florida have greatly impacted the industry. A fourth generation citrus grower, McLean said he made the decision in 2015 to diversify Uncle Matt’s supply chain to source oranges from Texas, California and Mexico in addition to his own farm – which was already facing significant declines from citrus greening.

“We’re watching the citrus industry in Florida really decline rapidly right in front of us,” McLean said.

Outside of citrus, Todd Putman, CMO of juice and smoothie maker Bolthouse Farms, noted that his company’s supply chain is vertically integrated, which has been integral to weathering the slow shipping and labor shortages that have created hurdles over the past year. While he said the freight issue has steadily improved over the past six months, the brand – which produces a wide array of juices including carrot, daily green, berry and orange – has been quick to seize on empty shelf space that has opened up as competitors still struggle to meet fulfi llment demands.

“Without that vertical integration, we’ve seen other competitors in the space not doing nearly as well,” he said. “We’re aggressively sapping up that space.”

Juice on the Table

Despite the supply side challenges, many brands are continuing to see strong demand from consumers for multiserve juice drinks – particularly functional drinks, with immunity chief among category trends.

Uncle Matt’s is now one of the fastest growing brands in the category – up 43.1% year-over-year to $18.6 million, per IRI. After the 2020 rush for immunity-rich products, McLean said the company’s vitamin-fortifi ed Plus and Ultimate Immune lines are continuing to be top sellers.

maker, Vita Coco, is coming to shelves in 2023 with Vita Coco Spiked, a collaboration with Diageo that will feature Captain Morgan Rum. With former major competitors Zico and O.N.E fading into the background, independent coconut water producers see the spiked version as an opportunity to revive the category and fi nd a canned cocktail niche beyond hard seltzer.

It helps to be attached to a category ripe for innovation: while there was a slight decline in the U.S. coconut water market leading up to 2020, the market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of approximately 22% from 2021 to 2025, according to market research fi rm Technavio. To compete with other hydration beverages, Vita Coco and others have released new fl avors, paving the way for coconut water’s status as a mixer in the U.S., a practice not uncommon among bartenders in Caribbean countries. Other categories are hopping on the trend as well: a new generation of premium spirits like Coconut Cartel and Montauk Rumrunners offer premium rums cut with coconut water or fl avored with coconut.

That momentum, combined with a shift towards premiumization and better-for-you beverages within beverage alcohol, has created strong tailwinds for Sunboy, which uses fermented sugar cane juice as its alcohol base (5% ABV) and is available in four flavors in 12 oz. cans. Having entered Whole Foods Market in New York shortly after being launched, the company currently ships to 33 states and is in talks with a distributor to enter stores in other regions.

While alcohol marketers are required to tame any health benefit claims, McKenna said Sunboy is being positioned to tap into coconut water’s reputation as a hydrating, healthy drink.

“When you’re working with alcohol, you need to be really careful about making any kind

“I don’t think anything’s at COVID levels anymore [in terms of sales], but it’s got a nice foothold in the market, and I think immunity is here to stay at a new level,” McLean said. “It’s fallen off since COVID, but it’s defi nitely still front and center in the mind of the consumer, and I think it’s basically attached to health and wellness. It’s just a functionality of health and wellness. So immunity is always in the mindset of the new customer.”

But as infl ation remains volatile, many retailers may not be looking to overhaul or radically expand their juice sets at the moment. McLean said that, in his conversations with buyers, most retailers have been making little to no adjustments to their juice sets during recent resets, which he attributed to the uncertainty of pricing as well as a lack of labor to actually restock shelves.

“The ones that are willing to make a change, it’s still got to be high quality, it’s got to be stuff that has a functional purpose,” he said.

Meanwhile, Putman offered a more optimistic outlook and suggested that retailers are still taking in new products. He said the brand is currently selling in nine new SKUs of functional juices and smoothies for the fall, including a new energy product that is looking to offer consumers a balanced and nutritious buzz.

According to Putman, premium products are still selling well despite the impact of inflation on consumers. The calculus: a refined preference for taste and nutrition wins out over savings – so long as consumers feel they’re getting more bang for their buck in the form of clean label, function, or just better flavor. Bolthouse, which closed on its acquisition of HPP brand Evolution Fresh this summer, has seen strong sales growth across its product portfolio – including a 20.1% increase on its core refrigerated juices and smoothies and 4.6% growth of its refrigerated vegetable juices, per IRI.

“A really important thing about shelf space is oftentimes there’s an intab of an aisle that’s premium space, and so [retailers] want to see a lot of velocity and a lot of profi tability coming out of that space, which they should,” Putman said. “And so what we see across that taste and nutrition fulcrum, if you will, is consumers wanting more and more value, more and more functionality, and better taste with that functionality.”

Nick McCoy, co-founder and managing director of Whipstitch Capital, also suggested that despite the air of an economic recession hanging over the industry, there’s still major signs that consumers are continuing to spend on and stick to healthier habits. Unlike the Great Recession in 2008, low income workers are currently outpacing middle and upper class consumers in wage gains, helping them to maintain certain spending habits and putting more cash back into the economy. As well, he noted that the continued strength of health trends like low sugar – and even the rise of alcohol alternatives – bode well for categories like juice, as long as consumers are continuing to prioritize wellness.

“People like managing their health through food and beverage choices,” McCoy said. “There’s this

of health claims. But I think consumers already understand coconut water to be healthy, hydrating, low sugar, low calorie, all that kind of stuff. And so we don’t actually need to say any of it,” he said.

For the creators of spiked cocktail line Osena, the idea to craft a coconut RTD was inspired by their experiences working in the apex of the hard seltzer boom. Co-founder Vicente Surraco was an intern at Anheuser Busch InBev’s ZX Accelerator and saw room for a drink that could expand on hard seltzer’s success and also tap into consumer demand for better-foryou drinks. The 5% ABV line, available in four tropical fl avors, uses an alcohol base of naturally fermented coconut water and has zero added sugars. After fast growth in 2020, hard-seltzer is leveling with a focus on premiumization and value over volume, according to drinks data company IWSR. Those indicators, plus the rise of spirit based RTDs, create an opportunity for a spiked coconut water to check multiple boxes for distributors, said Surraco and his partner Chris Allen.

“The base liquid of spiked coconut water is premium by nature,” said Allen. “Consumers are trained to spend $2.50 plus per 12 ounces for coconut water because of these ultra premium natural properties of the liquid.”

Meanwhile, CocoVodka/Rum has taken a spirits-based RTD approach. CEO Mark Convery modeled his canned cocktail, from retail placement all the way down to the front-andcenter coconut branding, after Mike’s Hard Lemonade. The 12 ounce cans also hit at 5% ABV thanks to the vodka or rum base, which are evenly split in sales. The product caught the eye of Tom Cole, senior advisor to the board of Republic National, while in a gas station, and is now carried by the distributor almost nation-

very real cost around health care, like deductibles, which is across the population…. So if you can cut sugar, and you don’t have to go buy insulin, well, that’s a lot of money you saved. So I think there’s a very good economic case for wellness.”

However, in addition to warning about supply challenges, the Rabobank report also threw some cold water on the outlook for continued sales growth, noting that the boost in immunity and Vitamin C rich beverages lingering after the 2020 explosion should be considered temporary “rather than a permanent reversal of the long-term trend of decreasing consumption in developed markets.”

“Aging populations, smaller households, less time spent at home during breakfast hours, and competition from other beverage categories like coffee, tea-based drinks and other juices continue to be powerful drivers that play against orange juice consumption growth,” the report stated.

The report noted that 100% juice volume sales in the U.S. fell by nine basis points from 2016 to 2019 before rebounding seven points in 2020. However, as many consumers began re-emerging into the world, volumes fell by three basis points in 2021.

CANNED JUICE DRINKS

BRAND DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs YEAR EARLIER

V8 $164,648,762 9.5%

Arizona $143,313,992 3.3%

Mtn Dew $132,925,093 -37.4%

Jumex $119,761,412 26.9%

Sanpellegrino $80,532,658 -5.2%

Minute Maid $54,561,533 161.1%

Goya $46,224,096 -5.3%

Foco $26,776,268 9.4%

Izze $20,280,094 43.5%

Kerns $19,937,720 9.5%

Ocean Spray $8,440,020 -15.6%

Parrot $7,880,561 -8.2%

Private Label $7,609,925 -12.6%

Bai $5,855,160 -66.9%

El Mexicano $5,470,438 17.5%

Hawaiian Punch $5,409,925 -20.2%

Jarritos $5,265,123 409.1%

De Mi Pais $4,402,395 27.5%

Zevia $4,218,376 93.5%

Country Time $3,679,101 -1.9%

BOTTLED FRUIT DRINKS

BRAND DOLLAR SALES CHANGE vs YEAR EARLIER

Snapple $362,125,783 15.3%

Bai $291,602,528 -3.3%

Hawaiian Punch $230,960,261 13.6%

V8 $190,172,354 -9.4%

Arizona $155,675,521 21.5%

Welchs $129,322,037 7.0%

Minute Maid $126,164,942 11.0%

Private Label $105,173,013 3.9%

Sunny Delight $93,413,382 79.5%

Tampico $76,454,895 12.2%

Good 2 Grow $74,427,601 16.7%

Kool Aid $66,283,123 6.8%

Hug $62,599,677 -5.9%

Motts $62,257,501 53.3%

Brisk $40,972,125 9.6%

Bug Juice $40,582,248 29.9%

Okf $34,306,196 14.9%

Natures Twist $27,485,361 25.8%

Robinsons $26,023,276 2.2%

Alo $25,924,873 14.3%

SOURCE: IRI, a Chicago-based market research firm-@iriworldwide% 52 Weeks through 8/07/22

But from the brand perspective, juice makers are hoping that consumers who returned to the category during pandemic lockdowns have been reminded of all the things they loved about it in the first place.

“The whole demonization of orange juice and sugar was leading a lot of people away from fruit juice, in particular orange juice,” McLean said. “And I think when COVID came, it was ‘Okay, wait a minute. Vitamin C, antioxidants, Vitamin B – orange juice has all those things.’ So it checked a lot of boxes for people, and they realized, ‘Hey, we need to put that back into our diet.’ And now it’s just one of the things that you really enjoy; orange juice just tastes great. So the products that I think coming out of COVID that actually taste great, and do have a true benefi t around health and wellness, they have a better chance of sticking.”

wide, with some presence in Canada. While Convery initially projected younger health conscious consumers as the target market, his customer base is skewing slightly older too. The company is steering its marketing presence into music-focused communities and has an impending partnership announcement with a popular DJ.

All three companies are on the precipice of expansion. CocoVodka completed a $2.1 million debt equity raise two years ago and is planning a $3-4 million raise in the near future to keep up with projected sales. Sunboy raised funds from family and friends to expand this year and launch into new states next year, and McKenna said he is now being approached by investors. Elsewhere, Osena is in the midst of a raise to step up promotion and has recruited several industry veterans, including Adam Lambert of Craft-Union and Liz Einhorn of Experience Three Growth Consulting, as advisors.

Meanwhile, the brands are sooned to be joined by at least one major player, which may not be a bad thing, according to the founders of Osena.

“[Vita Coco Spiked] validates the points that we have been making around spiked functional beverages as a valuable proposition for consumers, but also a place that wholesalers and retailers might want to place their bets,” said Allen. “And for us, I think that begins the process of really carving out what we think is going to be a dominant subcategory of spiked seltzer.”

McKenna agrees, arguing that the marketing dollars behind a larger brand will create an overall draw to the category.

“With these larger brands I think they’re going to spend a lot of money driving people to our category, and we’ll be waiting to welcome them all with open arms and high quality drinks,” he said.

San Diego-based superfood com pany Sol-ti expanded its SuperShot Line with ENERGY+ SuperShot. The energy shot features 120mg caffeine from raw green coffee beans and is made with ingredi ents like L-theanine, Vitamin B12 and organic strawberry and lemon. ENERGY+ is available at select re tailers nationwide.

Love Beets revamped its packaging for 10 oz. bottles of Organic Beet Juice and Organic Beet Juice with a Hint of Ginger. The new design features bright colors and ingre dients images. Both juice variet ies are available online for $30 per 6-pack.

Minneapolis-based functional bev erage company So Good So You has bottled happiness with their newest blend, “Happy.” The organic blood orange guava cold-pressed juice shot is powered by ashwagandha, saffron and Vitamin D. The juice shot is available at retailers such as Stop & Shop, Shaws and Target.

Garden of Flavor has launched in the Whole Foods Northeast region, and its garden is now growing in the Big Apple! The brand also just released its Tart Cherry SeaBuck thorn Energy Elixir infused with Trace Minerals and Probiotic Cul tures, our Cold-Pressed Tomato Tonic with Probiotic Cultures and Squeezin’ Greetings.

With five fun and functional flavors available in all 50 states, Me & The Bees all-natural, ready-to-drink lemonades are now sold at Giant Eagle, expanding the brand’s pres ence in the mighty Midwest and marvelous Mid-Atlantic regions and putting the company’s distri bution points to over 6,000 from coast to coast. The shelf-stable lem onades are free from high fructose corn syrup, preservatives and addi tives. They feature U.S. Grade-A honey, lemon juice and flaxseed.

Seoul Juice – the first Korean pear juice in the United States – has been picked up by Pete’s Fresh Market and Fresh Farms in Chicago. The drink is made with just three ingredients and contains over 400mg of potassi um per 16.9 oz bottle. The drink is also available online for $26.89 per 6-pack.

Coconut water brand Vita Coco is transporting your tastebuds to the tropics with the launch of its boldest-flavored coconut water yet. The new drink is offered in two flavors, Coconut Juice with Pulp and Coconut Juice with Mango. Both flavors are available for purchase online for $24.99 per 12-pack.

Monster went down under for Aussie Style Lemonade, the lat est addition to its Juice Monster energy drinks. Rolling out to convenience and grocery stores nationwide this month, this “twist on classic lemonade” is made with real juice and “Mon ster’s unique energy blend,” the company said. Each 16 oz. can packs 160mg of caffeine. Mon ster Aussie Style Lemonade is available on Amazon for $52.56 per 24-pack.

Organic juice maker Uncle Matt’s debuted Matt50, a function-for ward orange juice that contains “half the sugar and calories as regular OJ” and is boosted with 100% DV Vitamin C, plus pre biotics and probiotics. Matt50 is available in 52 oz. bottles for $6.49 at Whole Foods Market and Sprouts Farmers Market stores nationwide.

Florida-based juice maker Natalie’s Orchid Island Juice Co. launched two new lemonades, Mango Lemonade and Guava Lemonade, in 16 oz. and 64 oz. sizes.

Tiny Adults

Emerging Kids’ Drink Brands Look to Grown-Up Inspiration

Whether it’s the things a parent says or the things a parent drinks, children want what adults have.

Beverage companies are starting to use that insight to build a different type of drink aimed at kids to compete with the juice boxes and high-sugar drink pouches that have long dominated the market.

Historically, the children’s drink segment has been dominated by high-sugar fruit juices that have used splashy colors or cartoon characters to encourage little hands to grab them from

By Lukas Southard

shelves. But, just like their parents, children have become increasingly aware of what they are putting into their bodies and are mimicking adults in their own refreshment choices.

Although legacy drink brands like Capri Sun or Coca-Cola’s Hi-C still dominate the juice aisles of grocery stores, new entrants and more established beverage companies are seeing an opportunity in the segment. They’re reformulating existing products, deploying new packaging and playing to consumer trends like zero sugar and functional ingredients.

Slimming Sweeteners

Larger beverage corporations are taking notice of the shifting sands in the kids category and strengthening their positions accordingly. Zero added sugar Honest Kids was kept alive despite Coke’s discontinuation of its parent brand Honest Tea, signaling the beverage giant’s confidence in the children’s juice label.

Harvest Hill Beverage Company jumped into organic juice in 2018 by launching Juicy Juice Splashers which offered no high fructose corn syrup. In July, Kraft Heinz upped the ante by announcing it was reformulating Capri Sun juice pouches to cut out about 40% of the sugar content by using monk fruit as a sweetener.

The trend towards zero sugar sweeteners is gaining momentum. According to product intelligence data from SPINS, over the last 52 weeks, beverage brands with a “kid claim” or that have a “kid position” and are using a natural low-calorie sweetener are seeing about 50% growth in both the conventional and natural retail channels.

SPINS noted that stevia is one of the top growing sweeteners in the category.

Uncle Matt’s Organic has been using stevia leaf (specifically Reb M Stevia) as a sugar substitute in many of its products for a while. After getting many requests from customers, it “made perfect sense to be part of the lunchbox,” said founder and CEO Matt McLean, so the brand repackaged the Lemonade and Strawberry Lemonade into 6.75 oz. boxes.

“The juice box is a sleepy segment. It’s just kind of ripe for innovation,” he continued.

That potential is easy to imagine when there wasn’t much that the company had to change to produce the new kid-oriented drinks. Uncle Matt’s was already making a No Sugar Added Lemonade using stevia. The only difference between juice boxes and the standard 52 oz. refrigerated lemonades were the aseptic containers. That, and the juice boxes are fortified with immunity boosting ingredients like zinc, vitamin D and vitamin C from the acerola plant.

McLean said that the advantage of built-in brand recognition is that Uncle Matt’s can also tap into its distribution network easier. So far, the juice boxes are being distributed in Fresh Market, Wegmans and Fresh Thyme Markets as well as rolling out nationwide in Whole Foods and Sprouts in September.

“Being there for 23 years customers already know us as the premium, premier, leading organic juice company so there’s an obvious opportunity,” he said. “That’s kind of the beauty of it. We don’t really have to change anything. It’s who we are.”

Dressing Younger

SPINS has shelf-stable juices with a kid-positioning as growing 80% year-over-year in the conventional channel and 13% in the natural channel. Uncle Matt’s is not the only brand finding a lot of white space to work withe. Especially if repackaging an existing product into a kid-friendly format is all it takes to open new opportunities for a beverage brand.

ShineWater took a similar approach by repackaging four of their flavors (Fruit Punch, Watermelon Blackberry, Strawberry Lemon and Mixed Berry Acai) into 6 oz. pouches. Similar to Uncle Matt’s, ShineWater stevia-sweetened pouches have zero added sugar and are packed with Vitamin D, Vitamin B12, Zinc and Calcium.

The brand was founded by FDA physician Dr. Phillip Davis as a flavorful, nutrient-rich water that provided a healthy dose of Vitamin D. The vitamin is naturally synthesized in the body through exposure to sunlight, but about 42% of the U.S. population is vitamin D deficient; that number rises over 80% for children, people of color and the elderly, said CMO Ryan Coon.

“You’ve got little kids, they go outside and you put sunblock on, which you’re supposed to do because that prevents a lot of other problems,” he said. “But that blocks vitamin D absorption completely. And so that’s why young children have such a high propensity for vitamin D deficiency.”

ShineWater launched the pouches in April after eight months of research and development. The functional water maker realized that it was an opportune time to launch into the segment because many large retailers had been reporting supply shortages since the pandemic began.

“That was our ‘a-ha moment’ because we knew kids loved it,” Coon said. “There’s a lot of brands in the nutrient-dense water but nothing is in the kid space. It’s either a watered down version of a fruit juice, or just a straight fl avored product, or perhaps maybe some vitamin C in there, but nothing really beyond that.”

So far “orders are coming in fast and furious,” Coon continued, and the early reports from Walmart, where the brand began distributing in August, were positive.

The decision to go with pouches was not to go directly at Capri Sun but to fi nd packaging that had as little waste as possible. It also comes down to portability and the company’s internal research said that children not only favored pouches but it provided a new opportunity for ShineWater in stores.

“The top couple dogs have done a great job and they monopolize 90% of that shelf space. And when they had a hiccup in their supply chain, the whole system collapses,” Coon said. What we’re hearing from buyers more and more now is that they don’t

want to go back to that reliance. That’s a big risk for them. They want to diversify their sets more and we’re more than willing.”

The decision to expand ShineWater into the kid space was also based on the idea that kids can and want to consume what they see adults eating and drinking.

“You don’t have to have a product specialized for kids. Kids can consume adult foods. They’re not just these little chicken nugget/chocolate milk monsters,” Coon joked.

Little Hands

This is true across the board. More and more brands are seeing that – with the obvious exception of alcohol or cannabis –children are looking for brands that mimic what they see in the hands of their adult counterparts.

Other brands have built on this idea. Tickle Water launched their sparkling water in 2016 targeting parents looking for a fun alternative to sugar-laden kids drinks. In 2018, RETHINK Brands launched a kid-specifi c fl avored boxed water to complement its boxed water portfolio. It later expanded into a monk fruit-sweetened Juice Splash line that boasted one gram of natural sugar.

It was this belief in building kid-specific versions of adult drinks that led Liz Seeyle and Erin Fasano to found Starryside Company and launch its fi rst product: Star Water. The fl avored water sweetened with monk fruit is fortified with vitamins C, D, and Zinc and contains zero calories and zero sugar. The initial release of Star Water comes in three fl avors: Rockin’ Root Beer, Beachy Peachy Strawberry, and Magical Mango Pineapple.

The brand is targeting families who have left the more traditional kids juice aisle because there aren’t enough low-sugar, functional hydration options for kids. Early on, packaging became a big part of Star Water evolution. When Seeyle and Fasano started testing juice boxes with their children at birthday parties and the kids complained that the boxes were not recyclable, the two founders had the realization that Star Water would be packaged in six-ounce aluminum cans.

“The key was putting them in little cans for little hands,” Seeyle said.

Seeyle founded a brand consultancy fi rm Starry-Eyed Strategy to capitalize on her experience working in the CPG industry. She is using her institutional knowledge to pitch Star Water as not only an immunity-boosting, fl avored water for kids but also a means to empower children to be more creative. She sees a clear link between nutrition and imagination and is building the brand around that idea.

“We’re dreaming up drinks and snacks to ensure kids’ creativity lasts,” she said. “Then it comes down to how do we compare with what’s on the shelves now. How do we break it down by the packaging, the calorie content, the ingredients and prove that it’s a better option.”

Currently, the brand is sold primarily D2C but is in talks with major retailers as it tries to break into brick-and-mortar. Seeyle hopes that using a sustainability angle will help push Star Water onto the shelves of retailers like Kroger which has its Zero Hero recycling program.

Beverage brands are seeing that it isn’t just the ingredient list and the price point that is pushing parents to try something new for their children’s school lunches. Brands need to offer a total package to conscious consumers who are searching for something familiar but innovative when they walk the kids beverage aisle.

Most importantly, it needs to be something those little hands love to grab.

Functional on-the-go beverage brand Gnusante’s Gnubees line is bringing tasty functionality to kids beverages with a balance of protein, fiber, and more that is both dietitian and pickyeater approved. The brand will launch its Tropical Unstoppable, Lemon Limelight, Strawberry Wise and Grape Aspiration functional fruit shakes at H-E-B in October with revamped packaging. The Gnubees Plus line contains 8 grams of grass-fed protein, 4 grams of fiber and 30% of daily recommended vitamin C & D.

Colorado-based natural food and beverage brand Starryside Co. announced the launch of its first product, Star Water. Star Water is an organic, immunity-boosting beverage for kids offered in three flavors: Rockin’ Root Beer, Beachy Peachy Strawberry, and Magical Mango Pineapple. All three products are fortified with vitamins C, D, and Zinc to support immunity, and contain 0 grams of sugar, 0 calories, and 0% juice.

Florida-based, family owned organic juice company Uncle Matt’s Organic launched two new offerings for kids: No Sugar Added Lemonade Juice Box and No Sugar Added Strawberry Lemonade Juice Box. The shelf-stable line contains zero added sugars, is sweetened with stevia and boosted with 150% DV Vitamin C, plus 25% DV Vitamin D and Zinc for immune support. Like the rest of the brand’s products, the new juices are certified glyphosate residue free by The Detox Project.

Capri Sun’s monk fruit-sweetened juice pouches are now rolling out at retailers nationwide. Available in 10 flavors – Wild Cherry, Tropical Punch, Fruit Punch, Pacific Cooler, Splash Cooler, Dragon Fruit Punch, Lemonade, Strawberry Kiwi, Mountain Cooler and Passionfruit Mango – the new pouches will reduce added sugar content from 11 grams to 5 grams. The lower sugar drinks come after Kraft Heinz updated its Global Nutrition Guidelines to commit to reducing total sugar in its products by more than 60 million pounds across its global portfolio by 2025.

GoodBelly has launched GoodBelly KIDS!, the brand’s first multi-serve probiotic specifically formulated for children. GoodBelly KIDS! is available in 32 oz. quarts in three kid-friendly flavors: Fruit Punch Party, Apple Orchard Adventure and Berry Blast Off. Apple Orchard adventure is available at Aldi stores nationwide, while Fruit Punch Party and Berry Blast Off can be found at Sprouts stores nationwide. Like the

rest of the brand’s products, GoodBelly KIDS! drinks contain Lactobacillus Plantarum 299v, which is found naturally in the digestive system and may help promote healthy digestion.

Clover Sonoma, a third-generation familyowned and operated dairy and Certified B Corporation, added two new organic plus milks to its Clover the Rainbow line for kids – Lactose Free Organic Whole Milk and DHA Omega-3 with Choline Organic Whole Milk. The new offering joins existing Clover the Rainbow line products including Organic DHA Omega-3 Milk and Strawberry Carrot, Strawberry Banana Butternut and Blueberry Beet yogurt smoothies. The product line is available online and at Whole Foods Market stores.

Enhanced water brand ShineWater, which includes 100% of the daily recommended dose of Vitamin D, is now launching its hydration drinks in kid-friendly 6 oz. pouches. The new format features two of the brand’s best selling flavors: Strawberry Lemonade and Mixed Berry Acai. Each pouch is free from added sugar, artificial colors and artificial flavors. Strawberry Lemonade and Mixed Berry Acai are available for a suggested retail price of $3.99 to $4.99 per 8-pack.

KidsLuv, the vitamin-enhanced, zero sugar kids beverage, introduced its newest flavor: Beary Berry. The new flavor contains Vitamin D and Zinc and joins the brand’s three existing funluving flavors: Flying Fla-Mango, Peach Me I’m Orange, and Starstruck Coconut. KidsLuv products are 100% clean labeled, certified nonGMO, kosher, gluten-free and vegan. Each 8 oz. carton of Beary Berry packs nine essential vitamins and minerals, including Vitamin C, Vitamin B-3 and Vitamin B-6. KidsLuv Beary Berry is available online for $37.99 per 16-pack of 8 oz. resealable drink cartons.

Actress Gabrielle Union, Alex Buckley, and Maggie Patton launched Bitsy’s Swish, an electrolyte and immunity-boosting drink mix specifically formulated for kids. The entire line is free from artificial sweeteners, colors, flavors and preservatives. The mixes are sweetened with organic stevia and monk fruit and each graband-go stick has just 1 gram of added sugar per serving. All four flavors – Blue Raspberry, Pink Lemonade, Fruit Punch and Cotton Candy –are available at Walmart for $4.98 per box of 6 single-serve packets.

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Pack the Protein, Not the Sugar!

The New Primal

Give the mini version of you, a mini version of your favorite snack. Each of our all-natural chicken mini meat sticks is packed with 3g of protein and only 1g of natural sugar. They’re perfect for lunchtime or on-the-go snack time!

Zero Sugar Meat Snacks Packed with Protein!

The New Primal All-natural turkey with punches of flavor from your favorite spices all packed into portable sticks with ZERO SUGAR, 7g of protein, and 45 calories. On-the-go snacking has never been easier or better for you! Also available in beef or chicken sticks.

Welcome Back To Candy! Crush A Bag Guilt-Free Without The Sugar Crash!

TiDBiTS Candy

Satisfy your sweet tooth with the best tasting, better-for-you gummy candy!

Bursting with flavor from real fruit juice and only 4g of sugar per bag. No corn syrup, sugar alcohols or artificial colors. Female-founded and mother approved!

All-Natural “Snack Pack” featuring flavorful mustards!

Yo Pitts! Foods

Yo Pitts! Foods is an all-natural condiment line with a full flavor spectrum. We chose two of our mustard flavors to pair with pretzels and bread sticks to create four delicious snack pack options for on-the-go snacks or meal companions.

REAL

Grain-Free Cactus Chips packed with flavor, crunch AND benefits! Tia Lupita® Foods

Delivering permissible indulgence with creamy greek yogurt snacks Yasso Inc

As a flavor manufacturer abelei creates delicious, application-specific flavors assisting our clients in getting to market faster with flavorings that fit their product requirements. abelei specializes in creating great-tasting sweet brown, citrus fruit, soft fruit and other top-note flavors perfect for the beverages, food, confectionery, dairy, health & nutrition and pet industries.

Scientific & Regulatory

AIBMR Life Sciences, Inc.

Innovators of plant-based, nutrient-dense sustainable ingredients since 2005. The ONLY FDA GRAS rice protein, Oryzatein is smooth & also has 4 clinical studies vs whey with patented claims. And the ONLY rice & oat dairy alternatives certified whole grain & allergen-friendly. Looking for pumpkin protein or extruded pea + fava protein from Europe? Sacha Inchi protein from Peru? We have those too.

Connecting Nutrition & Health

BENEO Inc.

AIBMR is an industry-leading scientific and regulatory consulting firm, founded in 1978.

AIBMR offers key services specifically tailored to the natural products marketplace, including GRAS Independent Conclusions, FDA GRAS & NDI Notifications, toxicology studies, label reviews, claims substantiation, FDA & FTC compliance, and manuscript preparation & publication.

Probiotic Ingredients

From energy drinks to protein and meal replacement beverages, low glycemic Palatinose™ (isomaltulose) opens the door to nutritionally optimised beverages. Its slow release of glucose…the main fuel for body and brain…supports blood sugar management while keeping you supplied with sustained energy, whether for exercising, training/competitions, or simply for those long, demanding days.

Re-Imagine the Possibilities Bioenergy Life Science (BLS)

BLS is your Total Solution Provider. Our patented, researched ingredients will propel your functional foods and beverages beyond the competition. Great things can happen when you sharpen your competitive edge with Bioenergy Ribose® and RiaGev® because our patented ingredients do more, and they do it better.

Bioenergy Ribose does more than enable beverage formulas to deliver noticeable, sustained energy by replenishing cellular ATP. It’s the secret behind plant-based proteins’ mouthwatering flavor and aroma. And functional foods and beverages formulated with RiaGev may benefit cognition and concentration as well as simultaneous increases in ATP, NAD and glutathione production. Both provide better-for-you snack options: granola bites, gummies, fruit snacks, energy bars and much more!

From clean labels, non-GMO and sustainability to plant-based, low-glycemic and keto-friendly, consumer demand is transforming the global food system. Trust BLS to partner with you on everything from ingredient selection and formulation to strategic marketing support.

We’re re-imagining the possibilities!

Abelei

Axiom Foods

US Plant Milk+Protein w/Claims

Caliper ingredients are fast-acting, water-soluble cannabinoids that are easily introduced into any application using standard production equipment and with no noticeable impact to flavor, consistency, texture, or appearance. Designed for rapid go-to-market and scalable manufacturing across food, beverage, supplements, and topical care applications, and come with FDA-ready documentation.

Real People. True Flavor.

Callisons

Since 1903, Callisons has created authentic flavors using the highest quality, natural extracts directly from nature. Known as the leader in mint, Callisons develops a diverse portfolio of true flavors with a passion for the Beverage, Confection & Oral Care industries. As tastes change and the market expands, we evolve and innovate to always remain on the forefront of the next flavor revolution.

Process Authority for Beverages Caporale Consulting

Clean Label Ingredients

Farbest Brands

Our Ingredients. Your Sourcing Simplified. We can help you meet the demand for clean-label ingredients with a full range of high-quality dairy and plant proteins, gum acacia, vitamins, sweeteners, natural colors, as well as USDAcertified organic, and NON-GMO Project Verified ingredients No matter your budget, application, or label claim we can guide you to the ingredients that are right for you.

Custom Flavor Development

Flavor Dynamics, Inc.

We are the perfect choice for your food and beverage flavors. Our experienced team is guided by a commitment to creating innovative, superior quality products. Our "AA" BRC audit grade represents our commitment to food safety and quality assurance. Ask us for your clean label requirements, including Organic, Non GMO, Natural, Gluten free and Vegan. Our team is up to the challenge.

One Stop Date Shop For Brands! Desert Valley Date

Flavorman

Creating beverages in every drink category is what we do—but it’s not all we do. With 30 years in the business, Flavorman offers a wide range of professional services—from R&D, product re-formulation, and value-engineering, to shelf life testing, regulatory assistance, production support and planning, consulting, and much more. Partner with Flavorman and change what the world is drinking.

Premier Coconut Ingredients

Franklin Baker, Inc.

Gusmer Brewing Solutions

Gusmer Enterprises

Franklin Baker, Inc. is the largest processor of coconut ingredients in the Philippines and the premier supplier to the global beverage & food market. Franklin Baker offers an extensive portfolio of coconut products including Coconut Water, Coconut Milk/Cream, Coconut Concentrate, Creamed Coconut. Our extensive third-party certifications are unrivaled to the highest product standards.

Going beyond great taste Givaudan

For over 95 years, Gusmer has taken a revolutionary approach to serving the brewer’s vision. It’s why Gusmer offers a full line of solutions for the brewing industry including fermentation and processing aids, filtration media and equipment, analytical products and instrumentation, processing equipment, and analytical laboratory services.

A Complete Sales Solution!

Horizon Strategic Brands

A complete Walmart and Sam's Club sales solution built for success. Yours! Capabilities of a large Walmart/Sam's Club broker but more client focus at a lesser cost. At Horizon Strategic Brands, we provide a personalized and expert approach to building and scaling your business at Walmart and Sam's Club.

As the global leader in taste and wellbeing, Givaudan recognizes that the beverage market is now more fluid than ever. The pace of beverage innovation is speeding up at an unprecedented pace. This can be attributed to the fact that people are very open to trying new drinks. It’s an inexpensive way to discover an enjoyable food experience and has led to a lot of creativity in the beverage space.

For Givaudan, this means that customers constantly rely on our pipeline of innovation to create and respond to trends. Whether it’s a relaxing cup of tea, an invigorating wake-me-up coffee, a refreshing citrus drink or a botanically balanced beverage, we have you covered. Afterall, beverage is our largest segment for a reason.

Our expertise and portfolio span across the entire spectrum of beverage possibilities. By partnering with us to co-create your next beverage innovation, you have access to our vast array of research and product expertise to help meet your consumer’s needs - including taste, natural colors, botanical ingredients for wellness, maskers, mouthfeel, delivery, shelf life enhancements, clean and clear label solutions, sugar reduction and much more.

Visit https://www.givaudan.com/taste-wellbeing/solutions-segment/beverages to learn more about our expertise in beverages. Together, let’s shape the future of food.

Clean Label Sugar Reduction

Icon Foods

Since 1999, Icon Foods has been helping food manufacturers make clean, deep cuts to added sugars naturally. We achieve this by providing food ingredients and custom sweetening solutions. Allulose, erythritol, monk fruit, stevia and more are available in bulk or pre-blended for added cost savings. Icon Foods is your Clean Label Sugar Reduction partner, offering reformulation and R&D assistance.

Formulation & Supply Chain

JPG Resources

We can turn your idea into a product, solve formulation issues, find the right coman, run and optimize your supply chain, and set the foundation of your brand. More than just a consulting firm, we are a diverse team of over 60 food & beverage diehards who have spent our careers getting it done in disruptive startups and at the most trusted global CPG brands.

Beverage Industry Recruiters

Kinsa Group

For more than 35 years, Kinsa Group has matched top food and beverage professionals, managers, and executives with leading employers, nationwide. Our recruiters are discerning industry experts in all disciplines. Connect with us. No matter what corner of the food and beverage world you reside in, we’ll help you thrive—in your business or in your career.

Healthy Snacks with Flaxseed

Pizzey Ingredients

Pizzey Ingredients’ PurFlax™ line includes a range of whole and milled flaxseed ingredients, adding the nutritional and functional benefits of flaxseed to your snack food items. Our PurFlax™ products are ideal for gluten-free, keto, vegan and other specialty applications. PurFlax™ is non-GMO and pesticide-free, and is guaranteed shelf stable for 2 years.

Family owned and operated, IFPC has been in the ingredient business for a long time. Over the last two generations, our company has grown from a sugar supplier into a national supplier of specialty ingredients and custom ingredient systems. We partner with companies in the food and beverage manufacturing, dairy, and foodservice industries; supplying quality ingredients, creating custom solutions, and providing expert advice. When you partner with us we become an extension of your business. From the ingredients we distribute out of our 15 warehouses across the country, to the custom ingredient systems we manufacture in our world-class Aviator facility, we always ensure the highest quality service with every order. We only have one goal; to ensure your business is successful.

Leading Clean Ingredient Technologies with Bioconversion INGIA

Direct

Trust the monk.™ MONK FRUIT CORP.

Sustainable Packaging Handles PakTech

Brand’s Journey to a Sustainable Future Printpack

Your natural choice for sweet brown extracts and flavors. Prova Inc.

Sunset Strategic Brands

PTM Food is your premier product development & manufacturing support firm. Our wide range of expertise, development, and creativity achieves an exciting point of difference between your product and competitors. We work hard to uncover key industry insights, developing products that have a competitive edge. Whether your project is simple or a complex one, we’re your team!

Fruit & Vegetable Ingredients

Stiebs

Pyure Brands sells clean label high & low intensity sweeteners, no-sugar-added chocolate chips & coatings and sugar-free baking mixes, syrups & spreads for ingredient, foodservice and turnkey retail channels. Pyure is distinguished for pioneering the first-to-market third party certified Stevia, Erythritol, Allulose & No-Sugar-Added Chocolate to consumers & manufacturers worldwide. Our team of customer driven sourcing, regulatory, logistics & innovation experts have over 80 years of experience creating & supporting our business partners. Got a cobranding idea ? Pyure is trusted for taste & quality by millions of brand producers, retailers & families who insist on reducing sugar consumption without sacrificing taste. Visit www.pyureingredients.com or email ingredients@pyurebrands.com.

Stiebs, since 2005, has been devoted to sourcing, processing & delivering the world's finest plant-based products. We offer a full line of fruit & vegetable based ingredients as Single Strength Juice, Juice Concentrates, Purees and IQF Cubes. From the beginning stages of product development to delivering an on-going supply of premium natural products, our team is here to help you succeed.

Sunset Strategic Brands works for you, and with you. Let us be your outsourced sales organization who can help you build and scale your CPG business. With 30+ years of combined experience, a limited client focus, & services beyond sales, we’ll give your brand the best shot of breaking through!

Beverage Processing & Packagin

TechniBlend

Ingredients for Innovation STAUBER

At TechniBlend, we supply beverage companies with the highest-quality turnkey, technologically advanced liquid processing systems & equipment. Our success comes from providing innovative technology & solutions, and industryrecognized service and support, to companies ranging from craft beverage producers to Fortune 500 customers like Boston Beer and Pepsi.

Beverage Premix Solutions

The Wright Group

Connect with the team of experts at The Wright Group to learn more about turnkey beverage solutions to add to your product portfolio. Beverages create ideal systems for functional ingredients since flavoring / sweetening systems can often mask unfamiliar tastes from functional ingredients. Microemulsion value-added ingredients often perform better in beverage delivery systems since they may not subject to the same cooking or mechanical stresses as in food production. Value-added premix solutions deliver performance and stability to your products... often at a cost savings! Custom nutrient premixes have been shown to work well in a variety of products even extruded bars, breakfast cereals and beverages. SuperBlend© custom nutrient premixes are engineered to perform at high temperatures and shear processes. The Wright Group delivers custom nutritional blends, vitamin & mineral premixes and microemulsion-value added ingredients for the beverage and nutritional supplement markets. Our 100+ years of innovative expertise, accomplished technical team, and comprehensive production capabilities allow us to provide shorter lead times enabling you to successfully bring your products to market.

Tree Top Fruit Ingredients processes virtually every fruit under the sun into a variety of highquality, wholesome fruit products, including fruit powders, frozen strawberries, fruit juice concentrates, fruit purées, formulated fruit preps, dried apples, and bulk apple sauce. Some of our fruit types include apple, cherry, raspberry, strawberry, blueberry, blackberry, peach, pear, and plum.

COMPANY

Abelei Flavors

ADM/Deerland

AIBMR Life Sciences, Inc.

Applied Food Sciences (AFS)

Axiom Foods

BENEO Inc.

Bioenergy Life Science (BLS)

Brave Good Kind

CONTACT NAME CITY STATE PHONE NUMBER WEB SITE

Mike Allegretti North Aurora IL (630) 859-1410 abelei.com

Leanne Levy

Kennesaw GA (800) 697-8179 de111.com

Jared Brodin Seattle WA (253) 286-2888 aibmr.com

Jackson Zapp Austin TX (512) 732-8300 appliedfoods.com

Rick Ray Los Angeles CA (916) 813-1878 axiomfoods.com

Sofie Colombeen (003) 216-8013 beneo.com

Penny Portner

Ham Lake MN (763) 746-3926 bioenergylifescience.com

Madi Sutherland chickenbites.com

Brazi Bites Sales Team Portland OR (503) 303-2272 brazibites.com

Caliper Foods

Jolene Jacobs Denver CO (720) 273-3824 caliperingredients.life

Callisons Kim Carson Cincinnati OH callisons.com

Caporale Consulting Mark Caporale Middletown CA (707) 987-9703 caporaleconsulting.com

CBD Living Sean McDonald Corona CA (800) 940-3660 cbdliving.com

Chelsea and Rachel Co.

Chelsea Jones Lake Arrowhead CA (833) 267-2620 chelseaandrachel.com

Chomps Chomps Sales Team Naples FL (847) 343-6904 chomps.com

Daily Crunch Snacks

Laurel Orley Nashville TN (212) 671-2534 dailycrunchsnacks.com

Desert Valley Date Scott Drew Coachella CA (760) 398-0999 desertvalleydate.com

Eat the Change Rick Tidrow Bethesda MD (916) 666-2730 eatthechange.com

Farbest Brands

Flavor Dynamics, Inc.

Cheryl Pasiut Park Ridge NJ (201) 573-4900 farbest.com

Colleen Roberts South Plainfield NJ (908) 822-8855 FlavorDynamics.com

Flavorman Spencer McGuire Louisville KY (502) 266-7377 flavorman.com

Franklin Baker, Inc.

John Slade Memphis TN (901) 881-6681 franklinbaker.com

Givaudan OH givaudan.com

GoodSAM Foods

Gotham Brand Managers

Susan Fecko Darien CT (307) 690-8381 goodsamfoods.com

Trent Moffat Yorktown Heights NY (877) 931-3030 gothambrands.com

Gusmer Enterprises Mountainside NJ (866) 213-1131 GusmerBeer.com

Harmless Harvest Oakland CA harmlessharvest.com

Horizon Strategic Brands

Joel Edel Rogers AR (479) 659-9771 horizonstrategicbrands.com

Icon Foods Thom King Portland OR (310) 455-9876 iconfoods.com

IFPC Mathew Brady Fenton MO (314) 422-2324 ifpc.com

INGIA CA INGIABio.com

Joolies LLC

Jason Berry Coachella CA joolies.com

JPG Resources Rifle Hughes Battle Creek MI (408) 506-5846 pgresources.com

Kinsa Group

Laurie Hyllberg (414) 421-2000 www.kinsa.com

LAFAZA Foods CA (510) 698-2318 LAFAZA.com

Liquid Core Gum Co.

Scott Schaible Denver CO (855) 558-9407 liquidcore.store

LiveKuna Santiago Stacey Sunrise FL (647) 993-5131 livekunashop.com

Mexican Superfood, Inc.

MOMO's CBD/Bean to BLISS

MONK FRUIT CORP.

MyBrandForce

Nutty Gourmet

Outstanding Foods

Maru Davila Fort Lauderdale FL (858) 254-5826 heroicamexico.com

Mo George-Payette Huntington Beach CA (714) 401-7435 momoscbd.com

Paul Paslaski Libertyville IL (847) 367-6665 monkfruitcorp.com

Chris Hughes Greenwood Village CO (312) 953-3012 mybrandforce..com

Tony Varni Hughson CA (209) 448-6105 nuttygourmet.com

Kim Nieves Los Angeles CA (404) 227-4043 outstandingfoods.com

PakTech OR (541) 461-5000 PakTech-opi.com

Pizzey Ingredients

Plant Snacks

Popadelics

Mary Ekman Rockford MN (651) 797-3168 pizzeyingredients.com

Kevin Barry Needham MA (617) 967-6239 plantsnacks.com

Michael Casali New York NY (443) 593-5747 popadelics.com

POSHI Doruk Karakasoglu New York NY (305) 777-0948 poshi.com

Printpack

Prova Inc.

Rachel Morrissey Atlanta GA (404) 460-7000 printpack.com/sustainability

Julie Pickette Beverly MA (978) 739-9055 provaus.com

COMPANY

CONTACT NAME

CITY STATE PHONE NUMBER WEB SITE

PTM Food Don Rodgers Wall Township NJ (888) 736-6339 ptmfood.com

Pyure Brands, LLC

Rich Nuts

Gregory Drew Naples FL 12013889789 pyureingredients.com

Erin Drone Río Grande PR richnuts.com

Sattva Vida Karen Lauterstein New York NY (917) 596-4935 sattvavida.com

Solely, Inc.

STAUBER

Manish Amin La Jolla CA (858) 337-0593 solely.com

Becki Schwietz Roseville MN (714) 441-3648 stauberusa.com

Stiebs Brian Nova Madera CA (559) 455-8606 stiebs.com

Sunset Strategic Brands

Ken Messick Westbrook CT (201) 615-1766 sunsetstrategicbrands.com

TechniBlend Roxanne Gorham Hartland WI (262) 278-4944 techniblend.com

The Mariani Family

The New Primal

Terence Billingsley Vacaville CA (707) 452-2835 mariani.com

Caitlin Greenho Charleston SC (843) 323-9329 thenewprimal.com

The Wright Group Lafayette LA (337) 783-3096 thewrightgroup.net

Tia Lupita® Foods

TiDBiTS Candy

Top Health Ingredients, Inc.

Tree Top, Inc.

Hector Saldivar Tiburon CA (415) 420-2820 tialupitafoods.com

Kristi Vartanian Ventura CA (559) 906-0677 tidbitscandy.com

Brittany DeMarco Edmonton (780) 439-1425 tophealthingredients.com

Jeannie Swedberg Selah WA (509) 698-1435 treetopingredients.com

Yasso Inc Kelsey Gill Boulder CO (401) 578-8432 yasso.com

Yo Pitts! Foods

Tom Pitts New York NY (917) 826-0902 yopittsfoods.com

Waiakea Inks Deal With Yankees Star Judge

New York Yankees right fi elder Aaron Judge is best known in beverage circles as the face of Pepsi since 2017, but potentially facing free agency next year, he’s also moved on to a new chapter in business with Hawaiian volcanic water brand Waiakea.

The 30-year-old has joined the company as an ambassador and equity investor, and is the face of a marketing campaign that kicked off with large ads at all three major New York airports, followed by POS across the city including 6’7” lifesize cutouts of Judge in Bolla Markets.

The partnership also extends to Judge’s ALL RISE Foundation, which provides awards and incentive programs for schools and local organizations to reward academic performance. The athlete “will work with Waiakea to highlight the brand’s sustainability and give-back initiatives” via the Foundation, according to a press release.

Launched in 2012, Waiakea is one of several naturally sourced premium water brands staked on their sustainability credentials. The brand offers three formats: a refi llable aluminum bottle, a Spout Box line, and Oceanplast bottles, which emit 79% less carbon and use 80% less energy than virgin PET bottles. The product is currently sold at over 40,000 stores nationwide including Whole Foods, Kroger, Ralph’s, Wawa, Speedway, Walmart, QuikTrip and other retailers, as well as over 1,000 independent stores in New York City.

Judge is the latest athlete to align with Waiakea, which counts recently crowned NBA champion Klay Thompson and NFL defensive end Myles Garret. The MLB All-Star signed a multiyear endorsement deal with Pepsi in 2017, and became an investor in KDP-affi liated energy drink A SHOC earlier this year.

In an email to BevNET, Daniel Kleinkopf, VP of marketing at Waiakea, praised Judge for hitting on the brand’s three pillars: healthy, sustainable and ethical.

“We aren’t necessarily looking to emphasize the connection to sports more, we are just lucky to have a lot of athletes who love our product, drink it every day, and are sustainability and/or community minded,” he said.

After a decade in the water business, Waiakea is stepping outside the category for the fi rst time. This year, the brand released Waiakea Hawaiian Volcanic Coffee, a 100% single origin whole bean coffee from Hawaii available in two roast profi les.

As with all Waiakea products, the coffee is certifi ed Carbon Neutral, a credential that Kelinkopf noted the company is seeking to help build awareness for as many consumers focus primarily on packaging and recyclability.

Vita Coco Celebrates Launch of Its Coconut Juice with Roadside Experience in Texas

In celebration of the launch of its new co conut juice, Vita Coco brought a pop-up roadside attraction to consumers in Dal las, Texas.

As a testament to the saying “Every thing is Bigger in Texas,” Vita Coco’s “World’s Biggest Coconut” featured an inflatable coconut that stands over three stories tall. Additionally, the experi ence included local food trucks, outdoor games and an opportunity for visitors to sample Vita Coco’s products.

“We know summertime in Texas means two things: heat and the need for refreshing and fun summertime ex periences that help you cool down. The World’s Biggest Coconut experience of fers Texans both,” said Jane Prior, Vita Coco CMO, in a press release. “Our new coconut juice has a big, bold flavor, so we knew we had to celebrate the launch in a big, bold way.”

Vita Coco first announced the launch of its coconut juice in June. Available in two flavors – Original with Pulp and Mango –the juices are made from a blend of coco nut water and a “burst of tropical flavor.” The new offering is available in select con venience stores across the East Coast and Dallas for $2.49 per 16.9 oz. can.

To promote the launch, Vita Coco has highlighted its partnership with Cantonese-American restaurant Bon nie’s in Brooklyn, and its owner Calvin Eng. According to the brand, Vita Coco has teamed with Calvin for the launch of its coconut just because he “is a real, authentic fan” and because the two have similar roots in New York City.

Los Angeles Rams’ Bobby Wagner Takes the Field with Ladder Nutrition

Nutritional sports supplement maker Lad der announced Los Angeles Rams lineback er Bobby Wagner as the latest professional athlete to join the company as a brand am bassador and spokesperson.

“I’m excited to join the Ladder family. Throughout my career, I’ve always placed a huge emphasis on proper nutrition. Lad der’s clean products help me take care of my body so that I can maximize my performance and compete at the highest level,” Wagner said in a press release.

The news comes on the heels of Ladder’s first foray into specialty distribution earlier this year. The brand entered 690 Vitamin Shoppe stores, repositioning itself to target a broader active-lifestyle consumer base and making its supplements accessible to general consumers. The stores carry Ladder’s Pre-Workout, Whey Protein, Plant Protein and Hy dration products in a variety of flavors.

Ladder was co-founded in 2018 by NBA star Lebron James and former bodybuild ing champion Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Los Angeles-based company came about after James and his longtime trainer Mike Mancias recalibrated the NBA star’s dietary regimen in the wake due to significant cramping issues. Schwarzenegger was asked to consult on the product and help found the company.

Although James and Schwarzenegger continue to be the face of Ladder while consulting on product marketing and formulation, they no longer maintain ownership. The company was purchased by The Beachbody Company in 2020 and is now marketed as a premium, NSF Certified for Sport powdered supplement intended for professional athletes.

Beachbody SVP of nutrition products, Christina Cartwright, told BevNET earlier this year that the brand aspires to make the product more accessible to everyday active con sumers. Ladder is aiming to heighten its brand awareness with professional sports teams –the company claims to supply supplements to 52 professional sports teams across Canada – and leverage its partnerships into consumer-facing marketing campaigns.

Wagner joins the brand’s growing roster of athletes including NFL defensive end Myles Garrett, WNBA star Monique Billings and Paralympic Gold Medalist Jorge Sanchez.

Pepsi Celebrates the Kickoff of Football Season with ‘18-Week Party Pack’

around their football watching experi ence. Tapping into the ‘Tiny Home’ phe nomenon – something that is typically a shrine to minimalism – we turned a pack of Pepsi into a truly immersive experi ence,” said Pepsi CMO Todd Kaplan in a press release.

Pepsi celebrated the kickoff of the NFL season with its latest innovation: The ‘18Week Party Pack’ tiny home designed to resemble a pack of Pepsi cans.

“With the new NFL season getting un derway, we knew we had to show up for football fans with new ways to innovate

The tiny home – which has been out fitted with turf carpet, field goal-themed decor and a football-shaped ottoman –follows past Pepsi NFL innovations such as the Pepsi Gametime Fridge and the Pepsi Turkeytron.

One winner will be chosen to live in the tiny home for all 18 weeks of the 2022 NFL season.