After closing a $1.3 million funding round, functional beverage startup Evermind is thinking big as it launches online direct-to-consumer sales.
Based in Pennsylvania, Evermind produces a line of plant-based “cognitive elixirs” intended to support brain function and mental energy. Available in 11 oz. cartons, the three SKU line – with Vanilla, Chocolate and Coffee flavors – is made with 10 grams of protein, ALA omega-3s from walnut and organic flax, Lion’s Mane mushroom, guayusa leaf polyphenols, and citicoline, which supports attention, focus and brain health. The drinks will retail for $4.49 per unit or online for $42 per 12-pack.
The new funding round includes investment from White Rose Ventures and Ben Franklin Technology Partners, both of which focus on investing in companies operating in Pennsylvania. The company also received investment from the California Walnut Board and Commission; the brand makes heavy use of walnuts in its formulation. The round also included a number of individual angel investors, including seven physicians.
Evermind was founded in 2019 by Jordan Balencic, a doctor of osteopathic medicine and businessman who also founded and operates Balencic Creative Group and BrainPower Capital. It was his work as a doctor, and his longtime interest in issues like brain fog and mental fatigue, that led to his interest in creating a nootropic-powered beverage brand.
“I noticed that a lot of my patients were interested in cognitive health,” he told BevNET. “Not only were they interested in boosting their mental power, but they were concerned about loved ones and their families. I realized that holistic brain health was largely unaddressed [in the market] and in a craveable, convenient, easy-to-understand manner.”
Early on, the brand enlisted CPG marketing veteran Billie Thein, who previously co-founded plant-based milk brand New Barn, as its Chief Commercial Officer. Thein’s beverage industry connections helped to secure formulators and co-packers for Evermind.
Balencic’s initial concept for the brand was as a plant-based drink called BrainMilk, but he said that focus group testing quickly revealed that the name and positioning was less than intuitive for consumers (more than a few people wondered if it was milk made from brains, he said).
In 2020, he adopted the Evermind name and continued to work on developing the product, eventually developing a formulation made with functional mushrooms and moving from a PET bottle to a more sustainable Tetra Pak solution.
Balencic noted that the addition of mushrooms to the formula not only adds to the brain health and adaptogenic benefits of the drink, but also helps put the brand within a fast-growing trend for mushroom-based beverages, citing coffee brand Four Sigmatic as a notable example. Ingredients such as Lion’s Mane and cordyceps have also been increasingly utilized by energy and coffee brands, including Odyssey Wellness, G.O.A.T. Fuel and MUD\WTR.
Protein drinks are also just one format Balencic wants to place the brand in. He also hopes to develop light sparkling beverages and powdered drinks, among other innovations.
Beside launching online direct-to-consumer sales, Evermind is now looking to launch retail in independent accounts in the areas where Balencic and Thein are located, respectively central Pennsylvania and Southern California.
Beyond drawing from the functional beverage market, where he believes Evermind could be a replacement for afternoon coffee or energy drinks, Balencic hopes to draw in consumers from the supplements sector, where the nootropics and brain function categories have been well entrenched, by offering non-GMO, natural solution. His ultimate goal: become a $100 million brand.
“A lot of the brands out there [focused on brain health] are very niche and pretty much hype-based, and I would say focused more on supplements rather than unlocking the power of real food,” he said.