Odwalla is coming out for an encore.
The fresh juice brand, which was discontinued by The Coca-Cola Company in 2020, is set to relaunch this year under the oversight of Mexican beverage producer Grupo Jumex. The company is collaborating with Odwalla’s trademark holder Full Sail IP Partners, which acquired the brand from Coke in 2021.
Grupo Jumex is reviving Odwalla with a new line of smoothies available in Mango, Strawberry-Banana and Berries varieties, alongside three 100% juice offerings – an orange, guava and ginger blend; a green juice made with pineapple, apple and nopal cactus; and a 100% orange juice. The smoothies will be packaged in 13.9 oz. glass bottles while the juices come in 16 oz. and 32.4 oz. cartons.
Odwalla was founded in 1980 by Greg Steltenpohl, Gerry Percy and Bonnie Bassett, who at the time had been working as professional jazz musicians. And it’s the brand’s small, idyllic creation by a trio of art-minded innovators that the revamped product is looking to invoke, with “jazz” being the operative word, according to Grupo Jumex USA CMO Ariela Nerubay.
“I don’t want to give it all away, but we do want to lean on jazz and we want to lean on the vehicle that these founders utilized, in order to bring back that origin story and in order to engage with consumers,” Nerubay said. “Our competitors cannot say that because they don’t have the same spirit and they don’t have the same story.”
The relaunch will be accompanied by a full 360 marketing campaign, including an online social and influencer strategy.
“We actually want to lean into its legacy, its uniqueness and its DNA in order to re-engage a lot of its former fans and to create new fans,” Nerubay added, noting that she believes the brand can resonate with younger consumers like Gen Z because of its “quirky and friendly” identity.
Before his death in 2021, Steltenpohl – who helped lead Odwalla until its 2001 exit to Coke and who later founded plant-based beverage company Califia Farms – had occasionally lamented the direction Odwalla took after its initial acquisition. He told the BBC in 2017 that in hindsight he considered the sale a “pretty big disappointment” that erased much of what made the brand unique.
Carlos Madrazo, county manager and head of Grupo Jumex USA, told BevNET that although Odwalla will operate as a standalone business, the new products will be produced at the company’s primary manufacturing facility, using the same Mexican produce source and methods it uses for its core juice portfolio, including a pasteurization method that uses electricity instead of heat.
“We spent a long time, almost a year, thinking about how we could protect the legacy of the original brand, and all the great attributes that the company was known for at the time, particularly during the first few years, while at the same time innovating and taking advantage of the expertise that we have,” Madrazo said.
But after four years off the market, why launch a brand like Odwalla now?
According to Madrazo, the company believes that, in addition to its still-strong name recognition, the brand provides an opportunity to create a better-for-you product at a time where consumers are continuing to seek out clean-label and healthier drinks.
As well, the brand will provide Grupo Jumex with a U.S. focused brand that can expand beyond Hispanic and international aisles, he added. Although the Jumex juice brand is available nationwide in the U.S. with a presence in nearly all of the top 100 retailers, he said Odwalla will be able to compete in areas of the store that Jumex does not.
Grupo Jumex intends to roll out the new Odwalla in its existing distribution network with a focus on the West Coast to begin, and will be targeting top retail chains across channels including natural, conventional and mass, but it is still in the early stages of securing retail partners.
The announcement comes as most juice sales have been in decline, following a sizable lift in 2020 amid a pandemic-influenced trend for immunity products. Juice shots have outpaced full-sized products in terms of sales growth and the category has also seen a number of established brands change hands through M&A, such as Evolution Fresh, while other legacy brands, such as Tropicana (also under new, independent ownership following its divestment by PepsiCo) have similarly mounted refresh campaigns to appeal to a broader swath of consumers.
Grupo Jumex is currently looking to hire more full time staff for Odwalla, and Madrazo and Nerubay said they are seeking out former Odwalla employees to return to steer the revived brand, although they said it is too early to announce any specific names.
“The company is fully committed,” Madrazo said. “Jumex is a company that reaches 40 countries, and this initiative in the U.S. is one of the most important initiatives that the company has today.”