Since its 2022 speedrun from concept to launch in the wake of Honest Tea’s demise, Just Ice Tea has often measured its successes against its predecessor’s 24-year-long lifespan. And that is still the benchmark for Seth Goldman, who co-founded both brands, as Just establishes itself as the number two RTD tea in the natural channel.
“By the time we get to our two year anniversary, we will basically be as large as Honest Tea was when it did its first deal with Coca-Cola, just from a dollar volume perspective,” Goldman told BevNET in a call last week.
In these nearly two years, Just Ice Tea has taken over as the core pillar of Eat the Change, Goldman’s snacking company he founded with chef Spike Mendelsohn in 2020. But beyond uprooting Eat the Change’s entire business plan, The Coca-Cola Company’s decision to discontinue Honest Tea – which it initially invested in in 2008 before an outright acquisition in 2011 – has left a void in the RTD tea category that a wave of startup brands have raced to fill.
While brands like Ryl and St. James, plus a well-funded entry into the space from Liquid Death, have perhaps begun shaking iced tea out of its sleepytime stagnation, Goldman believes Just Ice Tea is already filling in the Honest-shaped hole.
“The incumbent players basically just looked at [tea] as a harvest category versus a growth category,” Goldman said. “So they weren’t investing in innovation and they weren’t investing in meaningful marketing.”
Prior to this new wave of brands, Goldman said many retailers had cut back on shelf space for tea, giving more space to energy drinks and other growth categories. This next generation is hoping to win back some of those facings.
According to data provided by Just Ice Tea, the brand’s natural channel business was up 54.7% to over $8.2 million in the 24-week period ending August 11, with a market share in the channel of 13.7%. In conventional, the brand was up 104.5%, albeit with a significantly smaller 0.4% share.
Data firm Circana, meanwhile, reported Just Ice Tea’s sales up 272.4% to over $6.5 million in U.S. MULO and c-store retail sales for the 52-weeks ending July 14, 2024, with only Liquid Death (up 335.1%) outpacing its growth among the top tracked brands in canned and bottled tea.
In comparison, the entire canned and bottle tea segment (excluding refrigerated) was up just 0.8%.
Just Ice Tea is currently in about 6,000 doors nationwide, Goldman said, but is anticipating expansion into over 10,000 stores over the next year. In comparison, when Honest Tea first partnered with Coke in 2008 – 10 years into its run – the brand was in roughly 15,000 doors. Even as high volume nearly matches Honest as that point, Goldman noted that with the core of Just’s business coming from the natural channel the brand wants to begin making a harder push for mainstream conventional outlets.
“As we look at this, next year will be a crossover year where we get into those mainstream channels and see that kind of growth continue,” Goldman said.
With expansion in sight, Goldman said the company is currently at 30 employees, and while growing headcount will be necessary he wants to be conservative in hiring, ideally capping the team around 35 full time employees for the foreseeable future with the goal of remaining “prudent” in how the company spends its financial resources.
That frugality extends to marketing, where the brand has emphasized grassroots efforts to connect with social media influencers and seize opportunities, such as a recent outreach effort to a sorority at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that was posting about the brand on TikTok. Goldman said that Just sent the college students free cases of its canned tea line to help drive more online content.
Event marketing has also been significant, he added, with the brand appearing at Mid-Atlantic tennis matches in advance of the U.S. Open, while in retail buyers have frequently requested that Just play up its “From the creators of Honest Tea” proposition to help drive sales.
“I still go to stores and see Just Iced Tea on Honest Tea glide racks, which is a funny thing to see,” he said. “But, you know, as long as the consumers are finding it.”