humm kombucha

Announced in February, Humm Zero is the Oregon-based kombucha company’s first entry into a shelf stable format and the first that doesn’t have added sugar (beyond what is consumed by yeast during fermentation). 

The products come in 11 ounce cans in four flavors: Ginger Lemonade, Blood Orange, Peach Tea and Raspberry Lemonade. Like Humm’s other brews, the base of Humm Zero uses organic kombucha as a base, while allulose and monk fruit provide the sweetness. All the flavors have 10 calories, no sugar, and added probiotics and vitamin B12.

As far as the taste is concerned, Humm has definitely done a great job of putting these together. There’s no mistaking the flavor for anything other than authentic kombucha; it will taste familiar to anyone who has had a bottle of their flagship product. We’d otherwise describe the product as light and crisp, with mainstream oriented flavors chosen for all four SKUs. The taste of monk fruit is noticeable but tolerable, and it doesn’t linger too much at the drink’s finish.

For us, the two standout flavors are Ginger Lemonade and Raspberry Lemonade, as the citrus flavor does a nice job of marrying everything together. While the other two flavors are also good, these just seem like a slight step above. However, all four are really flavorful and enjoyable as far as beverages with 10 calories are concerned.

The line is packaged in a slim 11 ounce can that fits visually with the Humm brand. It features a white background with “Humm,” “Kombucha,” and “ZERO” placed front and center. Below that is the flavor name, which is also impossible to miss. At the top and bottom are illustrated borders that feature an accent color that corresponds to each particular flavor. Also at the top are callouts for “zero sugar” and “2 billion probiotic cultures.”

The design is clean, easy to read, and definitely gets the point of “ZERO” across. While “zero” implies taking something away, the product very much looks like an equal to the rest of Humm’s kombuchas.

And of course, being shelf stable and in a non-breakable format are big benefits for Humm Zero. It can go places that their other products cannot, both in terms of retail placement and use occasions for the consumer.

In the end, Humm Zero, along with the other kombucha brands that are adding shelf stable line extensions, definitely feels like something that’s poised to reach mainstream consumers. We think they’ve done a superb job executing this product.

As we covered in October, Humm Kombucha has released a pair of new products that are designed to directly address a concern that exists across almost all beverage categories: sugar content.

The reduced sugar offerings, which come in Ginger Juniper and Raspberry Hops varieties, contain 5 grams of sugar and 25 calories per 8 oz serving. They are packaged in 14 ounce bottles that are, aside from label differences, almost identical to their flagship product.

Compared with Humm’s flagship offerings, which have 10 grams of sugar per serving, these products are noticeably lighter in body, sweetness, and overall flavor. But Humm has done a great job of selecting flavors that they can get a lot of mileage out of with a reduced level of sweetness.

Ginger Juniper has a mild note of ginger spice and a touch of juniper which pair quite well together. Raspberry Hops, which is slightly fuller in body than Ginger Juniper, has some fruit notes from the added juices (raspberry, elderberry, pineapple, apple and pear) and a touch of bitterness from the added hop flavoring. We were big fans of Humm’s Hopped Grapefruit, so it’s nice to see that they are utilizing this flavor in another offering. Overall, we enjoyed both flavors.

The end result for this line is a  lighter and more crisp drinking experience than Humm’s core flavors, probably geared for a slightly different consumer or at least a different use occasion.

When it comes to the packaging and labeling, we think that they’ve done a nice job of making these products look clean and appealing while also making it clear that this is a slightly different product from the core line. It’s pretty hard to miss the callout for the sugar and calorie content that’s running along the bottom of the label, which is otherwise intuitive.

However, use of the term “reduced” could have some potential side effects when placed next to the core Humm flavors. The core lineup has no such callout for sugar or calories, which could certainly make one perceive the main product as high in calories and sugar (they aren’t, at least in our opinion). From our perspective, obvious solutions are to either add a callout to the core line or to give this line a name that implies lower sugar or less calories.

Still, this concern about the label really doesn’t take away from what we think is a well-executed and novel approach to extending Humm’s lineup. These products are both really enjoyable and should serve as a nice foundation for further line extensions.

Humm’s seasonal offering for Summer 2017 is this product, a 14 percent juice-based kombucha that blends their kombucha with grapefruit juice (along with apple, pear, grape, and orange) and hops to create something that’s quite enjoyable.

Using Cascade and Citra hops, the product has notes of pine and citrus with a slightly bitter finish that will be familiar to anyone that has ever had an IPA. While we’ve had other hopped kombuchas, Humm has executed this product in a way that’s a step above what we’ve had in the past. Specifically, Humm’s use of sweet, bitter, and citrus components works extremely well with the effervescent and slightly fermented tea flavor that’s the base of the product. It’s complex, but really well balanced, and it has a flavor profile that feels more sophisticated than some of the more common kombucha flavors on the market today.

Visually, we’re big fans of the proprietary 14 oz. glass bottle that Humm uses across their line. The label has a whimsical background that’s loaded with illustrations. It doesn’t give a direct nod to the flavor of the liquid inside the bottle, but the copy, which contains only five words on the front of the label, is easy to read and intuitive to the point where we don’t feel that images of hops or grapefruit are really necessary.

The concept of a seasonal flavor, which is something that’s being used almost universally in the kombucha category, is something that seems smart, especially in that it allows the company to have something “new” every once in a while. That being said, a Hopped Grapefruit offering feels like a good fit as the draw for it probably isn’t going to be as broad as some of their simpler and more common flavors.

Overall, Humm has done a superb job with this product. For a company that’s largely going after conventional retail, it’s great to see that they’re willing to create innovative flavors that are a bit outside the box. And in the case of Hopped Grapefruit, we think they’ve nailed it on the execution front.