Since creating plant-based meat brand Daring Foods in 2018, Ross Mackay has embraced the daunting task of reshaping Americans’ eating habits and getting them to think differently about the ingredients they consume everyday. But even in its simplicity, his latest venture – hydration beverage Cadence, launching today – may represent an even bigger challenge: making salt sexy.
Sodium is already a cornerstone of hydration and sports drinks, but Cadence aims to give it more of a starring role. The zero-sugar, caffeine free, citrus-flavored drink contains 500 mg of sodium per 250 mL can; for comparison, a 20 oz. bottle of Gatorade contains around 270 mg sodium, and a 16.9 oz. bottle of Prime contains 10 mg sodium.
Cadence also contains 190 mg potassium chloride and 295 mg of magnesium lactate for hydration and recovery benefits. The product officially launches online today in the U.S. after a three-month test run in the U.K. and across Europe where it has earned placement in the mini bars of luxury hotel chain Soho House.
“We’re really just trying to hydrate you – that’s the one thing we want to own,” he said. “You’ll never see us doing protein or protein bars or things like that. We want to own salt the way AG1 [Athletic Greens] owns greens – we want to be your hydration partner from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.”
Mackay, a former international tennis player, stepped out of his day-to-day involvement with Daring back in April and for the past year has been working to build a community around Cadence alongside co-founder George Heaton, owner and creative director of luxury fashion label Represent.
“We eat, live, breathe this lifestyle [and] we’ve started to document the process of building a brand using products,” said Mackay. “Through our journey of building the brand, I’ve started to really focus on telling the story of our innovation as we go and do these things. We’re running the Berlin marathon. We’re using our new innovation. We’re [also] launching a new product that week.”
The duo is now bringing Cadence stateside: they’re running the New York Marathon together in November, using the occasion to test new products and host a pop-up during the event. While it works to carve out this emerging salt water beverage niche in the hydration set, consumer education will be important, but Mackay acknowledged those efforts can be expensive.
Owning “Proper Hydration”
Within the category, brands such as LMNT are also looking to build around salt for hydration and electrolyte drops maker Buoy similarly positions itself around that premise. Last year the trend of adding regular table salt to drinking water took off on TikTok as well, and has racked up over 147.7 million posts on the platform. However, Mackay said up until now no brand has really owned salt in a simple, ready-to-drink beverage format.
“Our job as Cadence is really to own salt as a revolution through cans, through other products, because the world is changing. People are moving more. People are caring more about how they feel,” said Mackay. “We’re at the tip of the iceberg of what proper hydration looks like.”
In order to convert consumers, potentially from other electrolyte products like the “Nuuns of the world,” the brand is starting small, using its site to promote academic studies and scientific journals that demonstrate the effects of its ingredients. Cadence will also welcome a panel of health advisors and nutritional experts in the coming months.
After that it will begin working with a roster of athletes. Unlike at Daring, where he brought in names such as Drake, Steve Aoki, The Kardashians, and Naomi Osaka, Mackay doesn’t aim to just tack on well-known influencers just for the sake of brand awareness.
“I’ve done the Kardashian campaigns. I’ve done the Drake stuff, and you could talk about a celebrity brand every other day – it has its pros and its cons. What I’m more inspired by as a consumer is genuine community, genuine authenticity, and founder-led brands that are not just like, ‘hey, here’s a big basketball player [or] a big name celebrity.’ I know that they don’t build the brand… often it feels a little bit detached from the truth.”
That control over the brand image feed’s Mackay’s reason for not rushing to scale wholesale as well, though he said they will begin those conversations in Q4. He cited Olipop as a proof point for its DTC strategy; the probiotic soda brand built a solid foundation online during the pandemic and this year is set to hit $500 million in sales via placement in over 25,000 stores nationwide.
While it scales up, Cadence aims to push the boundaries of the on-premise occasion, where Mackay believes hydration has never really been optimized. He believes that rather than “being met with a Red Bull or Coca Cola” at a luxury boutique hotel, guests coming off long flights would rather reach for something that is refreshing and electrolyte packed. That belief will lead Cadence into a number of hotels, gyms, mini bars, restaurants, beach clubs and more.
“What’s to say, when someone offers you water – sparkling or tap – there can’t be a water with salt option,” Mackay said. “[That’s] the ultimate goal… hydration has never been optimized for when I’m sitting at a menu or dinner or a meeting – whatever it may be.”
He believes at this stage in the brand’s growth, on-premise opportunities will afford it the most long term potential gains. As a first time founder he said he sometimes got caught up in trying to meet every request and do “everything and anything at any cost” no matter how big or small. This time around he is prioritizing focus in all areas of the business.
“Let’s look at the size of the prize. Let’s look at the time allocation it requires: How big can that be? How big in revenue can that be? And how good can that be for brand awareness? And if it’s like, low revenue, low brand awareness, probably not worth our time. I can see that now as a second time founder.”
That mindset is also dictating the brand’s growth strategy. Mackay believes traditional retail isn’t the only way to build a successful beverage business and hopes to “rethink” the playbook a bit. While the brand has plans to introduce new flavors later this year, right now it is honing in on the potential of its singular SKU.
“And that SKU can be a $100 million SKU… like Red Bull,” said Mackay. “They have one SKU and some seasonals… but focus is really big, something we’re really talking about is prioritization.”