Adina Prepping For Shutdown

A letter sent to stockholders of the long-struggling Adina beverage company seemed to indicate that the new age beverage shop’s doors are about to close for good. The company is selling through its remaining stock but is also liquidating its assets in order to satisfy debt obligations.

The company’s financial problems came to light last year when acting CEO Norm Snyder indicated that the company was in need of about $10 million in capital to sustain long-term strategic goals. Failing that, the company instead cut its distribution radius, concentrating largely on its accounts with the powerful Dr Pepper/Snapple Group distribution network. Those accounts were largely scattered geographically, however: sales through the Ohio, Texas, Pittsburgh and some California DPSG shops proved insufficient even as the company attempted to conserve cash by furloughing employees and otherwise reducing costs.

“While we continue to seek a buyer for Adina or its assets, we need to begin the shutdown process,” noted the letter, from the Adina board of directors.

Adina had morphed over several years from a fair-trade based juice drink play run by Odwalla founder Greg Steltenpohl to one that focused on canned coffee under a “Drink No Evil” message before finally settling on a platform of herbal infusions called “Holistics.” While launching nationally through money supplied by former PepsiCo CEO Roger Enrico and several investment rounds with Sherbrooke Capital — which installed SoBe founder John Bello at the helm — the company managed to quickly gather buy-in from a national distribution network of independent DSD shops. But the brand never quite caught fire with consumers, and pricing changes and never found a niche in terms of pricing and variety.

Eventually, Bello cashed himself out of Sherbrooke, and at one point was believed to be preparing a group to take over Adina, but the capital never materialized.