Happy New Year! To kickoff 2025, I’ll tell you about a few emerging brands that intrigued me in 2024. I don’t review or endorse products, and I won’t now. But I do taste lots of new drinks annually, so standouts jump out at me. Foremost, that means delivering on taste, which these products do. While each promises functionality, I won’t vouch for their efficacy or eventual market success. I also won’t judge their pricing, which can be rich. In short, these products offered an interesting proposition and ended up tasting surprisingly good — to me at least. So, here we go:

Nestle and celebrity podcaster Alex Cooper will launch a functional beverage in January called Unwell Hydration that is targeted at women. The drink, packed in 16.9-oz PET bottles, contains 700mg of electrolytes, a blend of B-complex vitamins, 75mg green coffee caffeine, and no artificial colors or flavors. Unwell is sweetened with stevia. Flavors are ...

Meanwhile, PepsiCo’s Muscle Milk Refocuses Within Growing Category.

Bernstein Analyst Callum Elliot recently dug into Coca-Cola’s Fairlife dairy business as it generates billions of dollars in earnings charges from earn outs related to...

This is one dynamic beverage industry.

Our lead story (pg. 3) uncovers how Olipop Cofounder Ben Goodwin intends to pursue $1 billion brand status — and he says he can do it without direct store delivery, at least for now. This digestive health drink, or gut soda as some refer to it, didn’t exist before six years ago. And Olipop helped spawn a formidable competitor in Poppi. Many alternative sodas have marketed themselves at the expense of traditional sodas. Olipop has been among the most successful so far. I’ll note, as well, that in an era when barriers to entry in non-alcoholic beverages are lower than ever, Olipop is a brand built on function, R&D, and efficacy. That’s worth watching.

The second story in today’s issue (pg. 6) features a conversation with former Coca-Cola Venturing and Emerging Brands executive Matt Hughes. He is a well-known and respected industry voice whose expertise bridges the gap between mainstream and emerging brands. Now with private equity firm Franchise Equity Partners, Hughes is tracking the winds of change within