In another sign of yerba mate’s rising stock, famed neuroscientist and podcaster Dr. Andrew Huberman, in conjunction with investment firm Tiny, has bought a majority stake in Canadian brand Mateína with plans on bringing its RTD products to the U.S. Financial details of the transaction were not released this morning.
The Montreal-based company may not be known yet stateside, but it has established a presence online and at Canadian retailers like Whole Foods for its non-carbonated brews in 12 oz cans.
In bringing on Dr. Huberman, Mateína is aligning with an influential voice backed by scientific credentials and broad reach. Along with his day job as a tenured professor of neurobiology at Stanford School of Medicine, his science and research-focused Huberman Lab podcast, launched in 2021, ranks among the most popular shows on iTunes and Spotify.
The show has also been a platform for Dr. Huberman’s growing presence in CPG: he partnered with nutrition supplement maker Momentous to offer Huberman Lab-branded products in 2022, and is also a scientific advisor for Athletic Greens.
“Yerba mate has been my preferred source of caffeine for more than three decades,” said Dr. Huberman in a statement. “I often discuss yerba mate’s health benefits — emphasizing its high antioxidant content, its role in managing blood sugar, and its possible neuroprotective effects.”
Meanwhile, its new owners, Tiny, have backed ventures including coffee maker AeroPress and cinema app Letterboxd. The Victoria, British Columbia-based group targets “investing and acquiring majority stakes in businesses that it expects to hold over the long-term,” according to a press release.
Tiny’s interest in Mateína is held through its private partnership, Tiny Fund I, LP. Mateína founders Nicolas Beaupré and Elodie Simard will remain at the helm.
“Tiny has been a huge supporter of Andrew Huberman and we are incredibly excited to partner together on developing and bringing to market this incredible yerba mate brand to the US,” Andrew Wilkinson, co-founder of Tiny, added.
Building the Brand
Beaupré’s passion for mate was sparked during a language immersion trip to Argentina, where he picked up the habit while working at a ski resort. Returning to Canada “with a couple of kilos” of loose-leaf yerba in a backpack, he quickly began fielding inquiries from friends and colleagues about the grassy herbal infusion that had replaced his regular coffee. That quickly turned Beaupré’s domicile into an informal import operation as he sourced connections in Argentina to buy in bulk and distribute to his network.
He and Simard, his wife and business partner, soon dived into the project full-time; after partnering with a family farm in the province of Misiones in northern Argentina to source the Yerba, the fledgling company received their first six pallets on consignment and got to work selling online.
The loose-leaf bags and accessories still comprise around 20% of the total business, Beaupré said, but the primary focus now is on Mateína’s non-carbonated drinks, introduced in 2019. Available in four 12 oz. SKUs — Lemon Original, Peach Passion, Blueberry Haskap and Grapefruit Guava — the flavor profile is distinguished by cold brewing roasted yerba mate, a style popular in Brazil that yields a malty taste more akin to coffee and with 130 mg of caffeine. A 12-pack goes for a one-time purchase price of $37.80.
The brand also has a complementary carbonated line with slightly less caffeine (80mg), available in Mango Key Lime and Raspberry Yuzu. Note that those products were part of a recall earlier this year due to alleged violations of caffeine labeling requirements.
As a RTD category in the U.S., yerba mate has been primarily defined by category leader Guayaki; the California-based company grew sales nearly 10% in the 52-week period ended January 19, generating over $155 million for its canned and bottled teas during the period, per Circana. Yet in recent years a slate of new entrants — CLEAN Cause, Yerbae, Weird Tea, Yachak, fellow Canadian brand Guru — have explored various ways to enter the space all under the guise of plant-based energy.
“My worst nightmare is to be categorized as a tea company or energy drink company,” he said. “So we really present ourselves as this yerba mate brand and the fact that we’ve been pushing and educating people on looseleaf mate first when we launched the cans, they didn’t see it as a natural energy drink.”
The Doctor Calls
With a high-profile advocate at the reins and new resources to call upon, Mateína is set to start an exciting new chapter in its history. Beaupré said that, along with promoting the brand on social media (5.7 million followers on Instagram) and doing ad reads on his podcast, Dr. Huberman – dubbed by Time as the man “Who Got America to Care About Science” – will be a vocal advocate for the company.
The partnership has already yielded one notable innovation: Beaupré said Dr. Huberman got involved with R&D in the creation of Mateína’s new zero-sugar SKU, launching this week to coincide with the announcement.
“Collaborating with Mateína to develop a non-smoked, sugar-free version of cold pressed yerba mate was a thrill and I’m so excited to be able to share this drink with the world,” Huberman said. “I see it as a truly peerless beverage in terms of its positive effects on mind and body.”
But don’t expect to see Mateína in retail stores just yet. The brand will focus exclusively on D2C in the U.S. for the first six months of this year before slowly rolling out state-by-state. It’s a strategy that worked for Mateína in Canada, and one that eases pressure on cash flow as it gets underway in the U.S.
As for manufacturing, Mateína last month onboarded a new co-packing partner in Canada, where rates are about 25 % lower than the U.S. on average, according to Beaupré.
All future roads should lead to the U.S., however. Mateína’s co-founder said the company expects the States to become “the biggest chunk of our revenues” in the coming years, which may foretell a relocation in co-packing or business operations, likely to California.
“I think just what’s really great with this partnership is that the day that we met they told us the vision that they had was exactly what I had envisioned for Mateína, so we’re not changing anything from the initial plan,” Beaupré said. “The idea is just to make mate highly accessible and available and well known across North America, so we just keep on moving with the plan.”