A semifinalist in BevNET’s New Beverage Showdown 5, Taki Mai is marketed as a “naturally calming” kava supplement. While the coconut-flavored product has a rather polished look and a straightforward and enjoyable taste, we wonder about the marketability of a liquid supplement that is made with a niche ingredient and in a category, relaxation, that — no pun intended — appears to be slowing.
While it’s not the first beverage to feature a cereal and milk flavor — that honor belongs to Larry T’s short-lived Liquid Cereal… — Cow Wow is certainly an innovative brand in its own right. The line of drinks is made with a USDA Organic-certified formulation and has playful branding and packaging designed for young consumers. With a little polishing, we think Cow Wow has a pretty good future.
Koa, the first runner-up in BevNET’s New Beverage Showdown 5, is marketed as an “organic water” made from 100 percent juice. Wait, what? A water made from juice? Yes, indeed. The company uses a unique and proprietary process to extract and clarify a blend of fruit and vegetable juices to create one of the most innovative water products that we’ve ever seen.
Sure, ready-to-drink tea remains a growth category, but the number of brands entering the space or extending current lines is increasing by the day. Crowded shelves makes branding and packaging of critical importance for brands to stand out amongst competing products. And the lack of a polished or innovative look is the most significant problem facing Pure Leaf, a line of iced tea drinks marketed by PepsiCo.
A semifinalist in the recently held New Beverage Showdown 5 at BevNET Live Summer ’13, Minta is a new line of mint-flavored sodas. The brand comes in original and diet varieties, each of which are packaged in a proprietary 12 oz. bottle. While the drinks could use some minor tweaks in formulation, Minta has done a great job overall.
There are a number of energy drink companies that have incorporated coconut water into their products, but, generally speaking, it is an ingredient that often gets overpowered and lost among stronger flavors. Fortunately, that’s far from the case with this Hiball Energy’s new Coconut Water variety. Instead, the beverage tastes, first and foremost, like a coconut water drink.
Yes, the market has — seemingly overnight — become flooded with new cold-pressed, high pressure processed juice brands. Most, if not all, utilize extremely high quality and/or organic ingredients, but does that mean the products taste good? Look good? Not necessarily, but in the in case of South Florida-based OnJuice, the company has done an excellent job with the formulation and packaging of its juice blends.
