When REBBL launched in 2011, plant-based functional beverages were still a niche category with little consumer recognition. A decade later, the brand now finds itself turning to innovation in order to bring in new shoppers and stake out space within a mainstream beverage marketplace that has embraced plant-based with open arms.
Last week private equity fund WM Partners acquired the performance nutrition brand from previous owner Danone. The deal is part of the firm’s strategy to acquire synergistic brands and then “build operational excellence” in order to better position them for sale to a strategic buyer.
BevNET is proud to announce its inaugural Cocktail Showdown, a pitch competition that will showcase the most innovative and disruptive brands in the rapidly emerging category of spirit-based ready-to-drink and ready-to-pour cocktails. Taking place on August 12, 2021, the competition will be presented as a virtual platform for the hottest new pre-mixed cocktail brands in America.
Better Juice, an Israel-based food tech company which has developed an enzymatic technology to reduce the sugar content in fruit juice, has raised $8 million in a seed funding round that will support the company as it goes to market next year, targeting international brands.
Since launching in 2018, the Greenbelt Craft Kombucha team has urged consumers to use its products as a replacement for sugary soft drinks or alcohol. Now, the brand is “blatantly laying it out there,” according to co-founder Gavin Booth, with the creation of its non-alcoholic, cocktail-inspired line of yaupon tea-based kombucha.
Odyssey Mushroom Elixir is a line of functional beverages that, as the name suggests, use mushrooms as their hero ingredient and pairs them with either a coffee or tea base. The products are non-carbonated and packaged in 7.4 ounce slim cans.
When Guayaki launched in 1996, it sought to educate mainstream consumers about the clean and natural benefits of plant-based energy with its line of yerba mate drinks. Now, 25 years later, they may be catching on. In recent months, the yerba mate category has seen an influx of attention and innovation from startups and strategics alike.
Alexander Harik, founder and CEO of Zesty Z, a brand of condiments, popcorn and seasonings inspired by the Mediterranean diet, discussed company’s positioning as an authentic food brand designed to reach a broad set of consumers, the process of scaling from a single product to a platform brand and how he’s navigated challenges and surprising roadblocks as an Arab-American food entrepreneur.
Earlier this year, Bear’s Fruit raised an undisclosed sum from Simple Food Ventures, a female-led investment firm focused on better-for-you CPG products. According to Driscoll, the company was connected with the firm by an existing investor, TQ Ventures, which had previously participated in the brand’s seed round.
The list of non-alcoholic beverage producers seeking to cash in on the $4.5 billion hard seltzer segment has grown a little longer. PepsiCo filed an application with the U.S Patent and Trademark Office to trademark its Rockstar brand in the beer and “alcoholic fruit cocktail drinks; alcoholic malt beverages, except beers; hard seltzer” categories on June 14.
Many food and beverage makers often look to adjacent categories for their first brand extension. However, caffeinated bar maker Verb is making a larger leap for its first foray beyond bars: EDM, which stands for Energizing Drink Mix (not electronic dance music). The new line promises consumers a jolt of energy from caffeine, not a bass drop.
In this weeks distribution roundup: Docklight Brands signs an agreement for nationwide distribution of Marley CBD beverages, Guru Organic Energy brings its retail sales, distribution and merchandising under the wing of PepsiCo Beverages Canada, Swoon Partners With Four Regional DSD Distributors and Biotin Water Enters Publix.
Today yogurt and dairy conglomerate Danone announced it had sold plant-based nutrition company Vega to private equity firm WM Partners. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Agua Bonita, the maker of a line of better-for-you agua fresca drinks, claimed victory during New Beverage Showdown 21 today, taking the title as the latest champion of BevNET’s biannual pitch competition.
