In the race for dominance in the emerging functional soda category, gut health focused brands have had to walk a fine line between being a wellness drink – with all the baggage that designation brings for mainstream consumers – and being a fun and lively soda pop. As consumers don’t typically associate the former with the latter, some of the top brands in this set are now working to figure out how to best communicate their benefits without taking away from their aspirational messaging.
Two of the top brands in the space, Poppi and Olipop. both completed consumer research studies this year to prove the functional efficacy of their products. In the case of Olipop, the brand is now going on the offensive – presenting a white paper backing up its claims and calling on other brands to invest more in their own scientific research. As the emerging pre- and probiotic soda set experiences an influx of competition from brands launching their own functional pops – including but by no means limited to Culture Pop, REBBL, Humm, Vive Organic, Revive, and Health-Ade – Olipop co-founder and CEO Ben Goodwin said there’s been a severe lack of studies proving efficacy for these varied products.
Meanwhile, Poppi co-founder and chief brand officer Allison Ellsworth said her brand is prioritizing flavor in its latest ad campaign as it seeks to make better-for-you a beneficial bonus for consumers. But that doesn’t mean the brand, made with apple cider vinegar, is abandoning its health bonafides. The brand also completed a consumer research study this year and is preparing a larger health-focused marketing effort in the coming months.
Olipop Prioritizes Science
While Goodwin said Olipop views itself first and foremost as a lifestyle brand, he wants to instill a stronger message around the science of gut health into its communications with consumers. Goodwin – who prior to Olipop was a product developer in the health and wellness space – said that creating a truly efficacious and healthy brand was a personal principle he wanted to adhere to with the brand. The company has formed a scientific advisory board featuring experts in digestive microbiomes and metabolic health which he now hopes to double in size over the next 12 months.
“It was really, really important that we didn’t just create another product that was built on shallow health claims using some claim on front-of-pack to quickly convince the consumer to fork over their hard earned money for a premium product. And meanwhile, nobody has any idea if that product is doing anything useful for them.”
Last month, Olipop released the results of a study conducted by Purdue University, as well as a second study done by a “leading American research university,” backing up many of the brand’s health claims.
The Purdue study found that the botanicals in Olipop may contribute to increased metabolic activity that supports the gut microbiome as well as increasing acetate levels across all participant samples, further supporting healthy digestive bacteria. The company presented the findings in a white paper co-authored by two of its scientific advisors, which concluded there that “[s]ubstantial scientific evidence suggests that the prebiotics contained in OLIPOP are efficacious in providing diverse health benefits, inclusive of mineral and energy balance, digestive and immune health, and support for microbiome function, at dosages relevant to 1- or 2-can/day consumption rates.”
While the study gives Olipop strong ground to stand on when speaking to retailers and consumers, Goodwin said he’s concerned that if other brands don’t take science more seriously, it could harm consumer perception of the space.
“We knew when you actually create a material disruption for soda, we obviously anticipated that other brands would try to flood that space,” he said. “And for us, the kind of principles attached to the products, the nutritional platform – fiber, prebiotics, nutritional diversity – it’s too important for consumers’ health to let that get eroded.”
In particular, he pointed to recent controversies such as government scrutiny over the efficacy of supplements brands, such as Goli, as having a potentially negative impact on the overall industry. If consumers don’t trust that brands are providing effective, functional doses of the ingredients they’re selling, he said, that could erode sales for brands that actually provide efficacious products.
Within the functional soda set, as a wave of new brands seek to enter the fast-growing category, Goodwin said shelf-stable products and ingredients with “health halos” but little prebiotic content are two of the key issues he sees.
“What we’re trying to do is start to create a standard that we hope that consumers will start to look towards and have some familiarity with,” Goodwin said. “Do [brands] have a credible scientific advisory board around them? Are they actually engaging in research? I don’t know the exact stats, but I’d be willing to bet that less than 1% of brands in the health and wellness space are doing their own independent research, actual academic labs.”
Poppi Puts Flavor First
While Olipop is working to center clinical data, Allison Ellsworth told BevNET that Poppi recently completed a consumer research study that found that although shoppers appreciate the health benefits of the drinks, the top sales driver is taste.
The company’s focus on transforming Poppi into an enjoyable lifestyle brand, she said, has led it to de-emphasize certain health callouts in order to lead with flavor. Under the product’s previous branding, when it was known as Mother Beverage, apple cider vinegar served as the hero ingredient with a consumer education strategy built around the benefits of the ingredient. Today, while the phrase “Prebiotic Soda” still adorns the top rim of each can, apple cider vinegar has been moved to the back of the label so that the front can “be fun and scream ‘taste’” she said.
“We want people to pull it off the shelf like ‘Wow, this is super fun.’ Take it, drink it [and find] it tastes amazing,” she said. “And then turn it over and be like ‘Oh, wow, this is good for me.’ That’s the journey we want people to go on.”
Poppi’s latest marketing campaign reflects this message. Dubbed ‘Big Flavor Energy’, the company has launched a series of out-of-home ads in New York and Los Angeles featuring billboards, bus ads, urban panels and street postings. Like the brand’s cans, the ads are bright and colorful while emphasizing enjoyment, more in line with a Coca-Cola banner than a health product.
Within the gut health beverage space, Poppi is not the only company tailoring its message around good vibes. Last year, kombucha maker Health-Ade unveiled a rebrand featuring new colorful labeling, anthropomorphic fruit mascots and text in the shape of a smile in order to tie functional benefits to feelings of joy and happiness. For Health-Ade, the brighter look is in service of a more direct and simplified message around gut health and probiotics.
However, for Poppi, Ellsworth said health and wellness is now being positioned more as a value-added benefit – even if it’s still on the front of mind when developing new innovations.
“The people that are seeking out those health benefits know that apple cider vinegar has been around for [hundreds of] years,” she said. “It’s nothing new, people know it’s good for you whether or not it’s got a ton of scientific data backing it. But it has that healthy halo, like ‘Oh, my grandma drank it’ or ‘I did the master cleanse.’ Everything we’ve done is not just because we think it’s good – it’s been thought out – but we don’t want it to look that way to consumers.”
However, health and wellness still remains a valuable marketing tool that Poppi can keep in its back pocket, and the brand now has data to back up its credentials. Earlier this year, the company commissioned a consumer study conducted by Citrus Labs Gut Health Research to determine the functional efficacy of the drinks on skin and gut health.
The study, which required 38 participants to drink one can of Poppi daily for 30 days, found that 89% saw “significant improvement” in regular upper gastrointestinal distresses such as stomach pains, bloating or hunger and 87% saw improvement in severity of bowel symptoms like gas and constipation. As well, 84% reported improvements to their skin, experiencing reduced redness, acne and hyperpigmentation. The results will also be available for consumers to view on the brand’s website.
Ellsworth said Poppi is now considering a larger study to provide more comprehensive results, and may aim to integrate the report into more health-focused marketing later this year and early next year – a “New Year, New You”-styled campaign is one big opportunity.
“We’re gonna have fun with it,” she said. “The mailer has some cheeky stuff behind it, and we’ll have sponsors leaning in. So it will still be done in the super Poppi way.”
The marketing campaign also arrives as the brand works to fortify its operations behind the scenes by bringing in veteran industry talent. Earlier this year, Poppi named former Talking Rain CEO Chris Hall as its new chief executive officer, taking over the role from co-founder Stephen Ellsworth, who has transitioned to the role of Chief of Product. Ellsworth is now primarily responsible for overseeing operations, product development and raising capital.
As well, the company this year brought on Chuck Czerkawski as its new CFO. Czerkawski previously held the same position at Essentia Water.
“I think what we’ve done really well with [investor Rohan Oza] on our side is that we don’t make a lot of mistakes that I think a lot of other small companies have done at the beginning, which wastes a lot of money,” Ellsworth said. “We’ve been surrounding ourselves with really smart people with a lot of experience. And so we’re just not here to play. We want to go to the sky and just keep rockin’ and rollin’.”
What does this mean for the category?
While prebiotic soda is breaching mainstream outlets and greeting commuters in New York and Los Angeles on the streets, Goodwin said he’s not attempting to organize any sort of industry group but applauds any company taking measures to back up its formulations with research. However, he emphasized that Olipop is so far the only brand to conduct an academic study, compared to consumer research labs.
As well, the push to call out competitors may have echoes of another gut health beverage category that hit the mainstream: kombucha.
For kombucha brands – of which multiple companies are now releasing or pivoting to functional soda lines – the fun versus health dynamic is well-worn ground. In 2019, when the category was gaining mainstream recognition, GT Living Food’s founder and CEO GT Dave took shots at kombucha companies attempting to make their drinks more like soda in a Forbes profile, calling the competition “bastardized” and directly criticizing Health-Ade for introducing “basic” flavors like Cherry Berry and Tropical Punch.
But despite the message to the industry, Goodwin said Olipop and Poppi may be more aligned in their consumer marketing than it sounds. Olipop, he said, will continue to focus on many of the same traits and messages that Poppi and others are leading with – fun and flavor.
“At the end of the day, from when we wake up to when we go to bed, Olipop will be a lifestyle brand,” he said. “We know that the taste is so important, and that the enjoyment of the consumption experience is really what’s of core importance to our customers…. What we are going to do is we are going to engage in additional research, and with the more research we do that gets to good outcomes, that higher and higher quality does start to unlock different doors. Whether it’s around claims, whether it’s around FDA certification, whether it’s working with certain partners, and having that kind of auxiliary credibility creates extra firepower for the brand.”
While protecting the integrity of the set remains paramount, Ellsworth said she welcomes the broader competition – and she’s confident that Poppi is positioned to remain on top.
“I welcome [new brands] more than anything, because at the end of the day [Poppi] and Olipop are the leaders,” she said. “It’s going to ensure the category has more players to where we can start demanding that carve out of a space for functional soda. So, to me it’s exciting, and I don’t see it as a bad thing.”