Better Booch Debuts at Walmart
Riding “near triple-digit growth” from the natural channel, California-based Better Booch is seeking to drive that momentum behind a push into conventional retailers.
The brand, a BevNET Rising Star award winner last year, has been primarily seeded on the West Coast and in natural retailers including Whole Foods, Central Market, Bristol Farms, Lazy Acres and Erehwon. However, co-founder Trey Lockerbie said the brand is “eager to test” its appeal at conventional and MULO outlets, starting with the world’s biggest retailer: Walmart.
Better Booch has had four SKUs of its 16 oz. organic kombucha at 120 Walmart stores since May, alongside a 12 oz. 4-pack for its Morning Glory flavor. Thanks to its price point ($2.99) and a can design that is “non-polarizing,” Better Booch is in some ways “built for the conventional channel,” Lockerbie said. The product’s initial run has helped confirm that theory: Walmart has committed to expanding to 500 stores in October.
Though still primarily focused on its West Coast backyard — having recently expanded into Southwest and NorCal regions of Whole Foods — Lockerbie said the brand’s performance has helped dictate its next moves.
“Better Booch is performing well in the natural channel in a lot of ways, and we are eager to test it more in conventional channels,” he said.
Outside of retail, Better Booch counts fast casual chain Veggie Grill and craft coffee houses like Intelligentsia and Verve as its foodservice partners. However, that’s no longer the case for vegan restaurant chain By Chloe, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December. Lockerbie praised the collaboration and said he hoped to continue working with the brand as it works through its financial proceedings. By Chloe was sold by parent company BC Hospitality Group to a consortium of investors in March, and must operate under a different name moving forward.
Meanwhile, after parting ways with Iris Nova, Better Booch is scheduled to relaunch its e-commerce business nationwide with cold-chain fulfillment partner Green Rabbit.
As the brand makes moves in distribution, it is also going through changes behind the scenes. Lockerbie referenced a “restructuring” of the company but declined to offer further details at the moment, or comment on potential personnel changes.
However, he did confirm that Michael Silverstein, a longtime consultant and senior manager at the Boston Consulting Group, has joined the board and invested in Better Booch, alongside other unnamed “strategic partners.”
GNGR Launching with Dora’s in NYC
Having launched during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and emerged with solid growth numbers intact, New York-based shot maker GNGR Labs is targeting the next step in its distribution growth with this week’s announcement of its new partnership with Dora’s Naturals.
The pact will bring GNGR’s two-SKU line of 2 oz. organic juice shots, which include its signature cold-pressed ginger as well as a probiotic-powered variety with beetroot, to over 4,000 retail locations in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.
In an email, CEO and co-founder Namik Soltan credited much of the brand’s success in capturing consumers to its logo and packaging design. Amidst a range of other cold pressed juice shots from brands like Monfefo, Suja, KOR and Vive Organic, Soltan said that GNGR has captured “50-60%” of the ginger shot market in New York City.
That growth has helped the company close out a $300,000 pre-seed funding round from angel investors, which will help the three-person team add some sales, operations and marketing muscle by next year. In the meantime, Soltan said GNGR is already looking ahead to opening a new round targeting $2 million to “aggressively expand” the company’s hold in the Northeast with Dora’s.
“After we signed a distribution agreement with Dora’s Naturals, we landed multiple product reviews with major national retailers,” said Soltan. “There seems to be a lot of genuine interest in our brand and products.”
The move to Dora’s comes after GNGR parted ways with Iris Nova, its original launch partner from last year, after the distributor changed its business model and shut down its DSD warehouses in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. Soltan said the brand is hyper-focused on growing in DSD, where its majority of sales occur, and is moving direct-to-consumer operations in-house. The shots are currently available for nationwide shipping on Amazon.