[00:00:00] John Craven: More SKUs, more data, more complexity. New Beverage industry is changing fast. VIP helps suppliers, distributors, and retailers stay ahead, turning purpose-built beverage data and technology into smarter decisions and better results. For more than 50 years, VIP has helped power New Beverage industry. Now, they're building what's next. VIP, empowering smart decisions. Visit VIPinsights.com for more information.
[00:00:37] Ray Latif: Hello, dear friends, and thanks for tuning in to Taste Radio, the number one podcast for anyone building a business in food New Beverage. I'm Ray Latif, the editor and producer of Taste Radio. And with my co-hosts for this episode, John Craven, Jacqui Brugliera, and Melissa Traverse. Three out of the last four weeks, we've been blessed to have Melissa Traverse with us. This time she's sitting to my left. The other two times she was sitting to my right.
[00:01:02] Jacqui Brugliera: I'm always happy to fill in for you. I love that it's assigned seatings. So like, Melissa, you had to sit in that chair because today you're filling for Mike.
[00:01:10] Melissa Traverse: It doesn't work otherwise.
[00:01:11] Ray Latif: Yeah.
[00:01:12] Jacqui Brugliera: Yeah.
[00:01:12] Ray Latif: John's in his regular seat. Melissa's in Mike's seat. I'm in my seat. Jackie, you're in your seat.
[00:01:17] Jacqui Brugliera: My personality will change too, depending on which chair I sit in. So, yeah.
[00:01:22] Ray Latif: So before we go any further, I was sent by the fine folks at Costa Rina, which is, or at least they describe themselves as a modern Mediterranean lifestyle brand founded by olive oil sommelier Katerina Molentanos. I think that's how you pronounce her last name. If Mike were here, he would make fun of me. They debuted or they've launched their first high phenolic extra virgin olive oil shot. So it's all the benefits of olive oil, which are backed by science, as we know, in a simple, functional shot. This is a shot, a half ounce shot of olive oil in a glass bottle. It is fully wrapped in a yellow label, and this says it's a product of Greece. So drink one. USDA organic certified. It's also USDA organic certified. How about that? Suggested use, drink one bottle a day. Jackie, once again, we've got to figure out a better system so that you can drink with us, but we're going to do some shots to start the show here.
[00:02:19] Jacqui Brugliera: Let's see it. I mean, it's Greek olive oil, so it must be tasty.
[00:02:23] Melissa Traverse: It tastes like olive oil.
[00:02:24] Jacqui Brugliera: Okay.
[00:02:25] Melissa Traverse: Sorry for the spoiler.
[00:02:26] Jacqui Brugliera: So does it taste like dressing? Like I feel like olive oil to me.
[00:02:30] Melissa Traverse: I want like a little bottle of like balsamic to go with it. Totally. Oh, it's great.
[00:02:38] Jacqui Brugliera: It's like those little bottles of hot sauce people hold in like their, their purse, you know? Yeah.
[00:02:42] Melissa Traverse: I mean, or like a thing you'd see on an airplane or another place where we're using single serve everything.
[00:02:48] Ray Latif: Melissa and I are dying over here because it's a bit of spice. Is it spicy? There's a bit of spice at the very end. So if you actually do it like a shot, you're going to get that hit of spice right in the back of your throat at the very end. That's just the olive oil.
[00:02:58] Jacqui Brugliera: Well, the more peppery it is, oftentimes the more polyphenols it has, right?
[00:03:04] Ray Latif: Oh, yeah.
[00:03:04] Jacqui Brugliera: Nice. Getting science-y. And the fact that they wrapped it in this yellow opaque packaging is really nice because the light can also degrade polyphenols too, so.
[00:03:15] Ray Latif: There you go out of everything right so it launched this week. You can buy it at the cost arena website It's $49 for a pack of 15. I'm doing the math which I'm not being able to do the math I think this is what three dollars and 15 cents something like that sure go with it for a shot that is but yeah This is great. I wonder if we're actually gonna start to see this multi pack or this This is the box if we're gonna see boxes like this set a hole for me.
[00:03:40] Melissa Traverse: I don't know this seems like It has a big re-education hurdle here. I like the idea of a mini bottle of olive oil. I'm sure there's a market for that out there too, but I mean, you could just do this now.
[00:03:54] Jacqui Brugliera: I can completely imagine using this as a travel size bottle of olive oil to put on whatever it is on your plane or your train or whatever, but I don't think I would ever just do a shot of olive oil because I eat so many things during the day that would be really delicious with olive oil.
[00:04:10] Melissa Traverse: Just a little drizzle everywhere.
[00:04:11] Jacqui Brugliera: Right. Yeah. And I feel like people will take like a tablespoon if they're doing it for, you know, hair or just health, but they'll just put it in a, on a spoon, you know?
[00:04:21] Melissa Traverse: I mean, also I feel like they're fighting kind of the obvious, which is compete with the plethora of upstart olive oil companies that are out there that have modern branding. I mean, I think this in a full size bottle would look pretty awesome.
[00:04:37] Ray Latif: Well, I think it would stand out.
[00:04:38] Melissa Traverse: Well, it shows what I know. I'm not familiar with the brand, but, uh, this, this, I guess I feel like seems maybe too niche then if they're doing that.
[00:04:46] Jacqui Brugliera: I also take so many supplements that the idea of taking one more thing is a supplement.
[00:04:51] Melissa Traverse: You could wash them down with an olive oil shot.
[00:04:55] Jacqui Brugliera: That's right. I could mix my magnesium powder into the olive oil.
[00:04:59] Melissa Traverse: But I won't be a hater. I really, I, the olive oil is great. I love the branding of this. If they have full size products, I'd love to see those too, but it's high quality stuff.
[00:05:10] Jacqui Brugliera: I love it too. And I would take this with me everywhere that I go to put on my food and eat it as a delicious meal.
[00:05:17] Ray Latif: Well, because you said that, Melissa, you get, we'll wait for the full size bottles to come in. Okay. You'll get some, don't worry. John looks so agitated right now. Moving right along. You know, what's interesting is I'm not sure if we can define this product, this olive oil shot, as New Beverage or as a food, or how would we describe this?
[00:05:45] Jacqui Brugliera: I say food.
[00:05:46] Melissa Traverse: You know, what jumps out at me is an encounter I had at a summer fancy food show many years ago, where an aggressive PR person was trying to get me to come over to her client's booth. And they made salad dressings and I'm like, sorry, I only cover beverages. And they're like, well, you can't drink it. So. Okay. There we go. Point being, is it New Beverage? It's just a matter of perspective and how aggressive your PR team is. Fair enough. But I do think that. And I did try the salad dressing. It was great, by the way.
[00:06:19] Ray Latif: If I were part of the PR team at Costa Rina, I might. submit or nominate this olive oil shot for BevNET's Best of 2025 Awards. I'm just saying, because I'm doing this or I perceive this to be New Beverage and that I'm drinking it like I would a shot, a turmeric shot, a ginger shot, what have you.
[00:06:40] Jacqui Brugliera: Also, luckily for you, we do have Nosh Awards too. So it's really just where you identify.
[00:06:45] Ray Latif: There you go. If you identify as a food, you should apply or nominate a brand or your brand or a product that you represent for Nosh's Best of 2025 Awards. If it's New Beverage that you're the creator of or that you represent, you could nominate those products for BevNET's Best of 2025 Awards. The key here is that... Don't forget about Brewbound. And of course Brewbound if you... And spirits. Market, make, or represent a beer or adjacent beverage like beer. You can nominate that product for Brewbound's Best of 2025 Awards. And as I was about to say, the key in all this is that you do it today because today is the deadline for all nominations for all awards. That's October 31st. I was like, what day is today, Ray? October 31st.
[00:07:36] Melissa Traverse: It's Halloween. I mean, you do have your Halloween costume on. I do. A nice arsenal kit.
[00:07:44] Ray Latif: I'm not wearing an arsenal kit. But basically, yes.
[00:07:47] Melissa Traverse: An Arteta mask?
[00:07:48] Ray Latif: To make it clear, our words honor companies, brands, individuals, products, and ideas, as well as trends from across the dynamic and ever-changing beverage, food, and beer industries. Today, once again, is the day. that you need to submit those nominations because otherwise you're out of luck and your product, brand, person, trend may not be one of BevNET's best for our various properties.
[00:08:15] Jacqui Brugliera: You can't win if you don't play.
[00:08:16] Ray Latif: Exactly. Exactly. You can't score if you don't shoot.
[00:08:20] Jacqui Brugliera: And you can nominate yourself. You can nominate anyone else you think that made a splash this year, and you can nominate as many as you like. Nominations also get included in our list of nominees, which will be published next month. And then we will be announcing all of the awards and presenting the awards on stage at our events this December at Nosh Live, BevNET Live, and Brewbound Live.
[00:08:42] Ray Latif: Apply or nominate your brand, person, product by today, because tomorrow is November 1st and you can't do it. Also, if you're thinking about participating in the New Beverage Showdown at BevNET Live in LA this December, the application deadline is also today, October 31st. And as we've mentioned in past shows, participants and winners of past competitions have included Liquid Death, Poppy, HealthAid, brands that are now doing hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars in sales. And they all started on stage at BevNET Live as a participant of the New Beverage Showdown. You could be, at least your brand could be one of those amazing success stories, but you got to apply. You got to send us some information. You got to send us a short video and you'll be on your way.
[00:09:38] Jacqui Brugliera: We have the founder of Recoup speaking at this year's BevNET Live and Recoup was last year's New Beverage Showdown winner.
[00:09:46] Ray Latif: Yeah. Susan Buckwalter Hartman, who's been at it for a few years and just gave a dynamite presentation at our LA event last year. And yeah, she is speaking and I'm excited to see and hear her on stage because she's just really remarkable and that brand is going places.
[00:10:05] John Craven: More than 70% of new CPG products fail, often over margins founders never fully understood. Outsourced accounting can close that gap for good. Visit belasolutions.com slash BevNET for a free small business accounting guide from Belay.
[00:10:22] Ray Latif: Artificial intelligence is reshaping every corner of New Beverage industry. But where is it creating real value today? Stay tuned till the end of this episode for a bonus interview when I sit down with Andrew Krizis and Lucinda Aquat of VIP to explore how AI is moving beyond analytics to automate decisions, improve efficiency, and transform the three-tier system. We never had Recess. Recess, the brand known for its mood-enhancing beverages as well as mocktails. It started out as a brand really focused on CBD beverages. We never had Ben Whitty, the founder and CEO, as part of the New Beverage Showdown. We've had him on stage. We've had him on stage, but he never participated. I feel like he would have knocked it out of the park on stage for the showdown.
[00:11:11] Melissa Traverse: Alas, he would have done it in the heyday of CBD drinks. And he's obviously pivoted to be much more than that.
[00:11:18] Ray Latif: Yes. There was a lot of hype around that brand at the time when it launched in 2019, I believe. And it was called or described as the Red Bull of CBD, Recess was. And yesterday it was announced that Recess raised $30 million in a Series B round led by Kavu Ventures and also added a key member to its staff. That's Kyle Thomas, formerly of C4. Kyle is now the co-CEO of the company alongside Ben Witte. Yeah, really impressive stuff. I sat down with Ben last year for an interview that I really loved, and it was just about how he pivoted from CBD drinks and being a really CBD focused brand to one that encompassed this idea of sort of chill and relaxation throughout the day, whether it be in the afternoon with one of their mood enhancing beverages, which is fueled with or at least has the key ingredient of magnesium fueling it. as well as their mocktails, which have been a huge hit. I see their mocktails everywhere now. And so I thought it was pretty interesting that Recess is where it is today and that Kavu, which is known for investing in brands like Poppy and Buy, made this additional investment. They had already been an investor in the brand, but it made this additional funding of Recess, especially because it feels like Recess is a platform for products in a variety of different categories, more so than one specific category. John, what do you think about their approach? Oftentimes we talk about focus and we talk about brands and founders needing to be focused on one particular aspect of whatever industry they're a part of, but Recess kind of has their hands in a number of different categories.
[00:13:05] Melissa Traverse: Well, they do, but they all share the same kind of underlying theme, I would say, of like a mood relaxation type of product. And I think usually when we say to focus, it's more directed at the companies that are like, I want to do a protein drink and then I'm going to do, I don't know, an iced tea or something to make up a ridiculous example. But this actually feels pretty focused and it gives recess the ability to not just be tied to. whatever the trending thing is of the moment, which I'm sure is by design, given that in the beginning they were tied to the hype of CBD beverages. And unlike a lot of the CBD brands that didn't make it from that era, they're still around. And, you know, I think this is a great sign that certainly Kavu, who, you know, led the round and was one of their existing investors, like really believes in them and feels like the timing is good. And again, I kind of would agree.
[00:14:04] Jacqui Brugliera: Yeah. Another brand that's done this really well is trip trip was tied to CBD. Now they're all about just calm. And I think. A lot of brands are finding success with tying to like one very simple call out and calm is very simple. Relaxation is very simple. People understand that. And no matter what goes into New Beverage, whether it's CBD or it's other functional ingredients, if they can wrap their head around that, then they're going to grab for that product. A lot of consumers drink recess as an alcohol alternative. And I certainly appreciate that they have different offerings for people who want to achieve different mood states. So they have one line that has some caffeine content in it from guayasa. And then they have the magnesium line and then the hemp line. All of them have L-theanine in them, which does give you kind of that calm feeling. So I think it's certainly helpful and useful that they have different products for folks who want to achieve, you know, different mood states, depending on what time of day it is, what the occasion is. And I thought it was interesting in that article in BevNET about the Kavu investment. Kavu said that Recess was providing a counterweight to the $25 billion energy category. And personally, that's something that I think is very attractive about recess. I don't really want 200 milligrams of caffeine in a can of anything. So that's certainly very. Yeah, that's appealing to me as a consumer, certainly.
[00:15:37] Ray Latif: Yeah, I mean, going back to where Recess started, and I misspoke actually, Recess was dubbed by the press at the time of their launch as the La Croix of CBD. And when I spoke with Ben last year, he preferred the tagline, the Red Bull of relaxation. The one thing I'm still wondering about is whether or not Recess will be known more for their mocktail beverages or more for their mood enhancing beverages. And if I had to guess, I would think it's more their mocktail products. I just see more of that everywhere. There's no education. You know what it is, you pretty much know what you're going to get. You just have to try it and hope that it's going to taste the way you want it to taste. Where their mood enhancing beverages are, I think it's more of a perceived functionality for most people. And so the education threshold is going to be higher. So with Okavu, I wonder if they're betting more in the future of recess as one versus the other, or if they really, really believe that platform approach is going to work.
[00:16:38] Jacqui Brugliera: I think there's so much crossover between mood enhancing beverages and mocktails because if you're choosing not to drink alcohol, it would still be really nice to feel something. So I think that there's a lot of opportunity there as well.
[00:16:53] Ray Latif: And by hearing that you, uh, you would like to drink more of those mood enhancing beverages.
[00:16:57] Jacqui Brugliera: I wish I could drink more alcohol.
[00:17:01] Melissa Traverse: The Recess Paloma is definitely one of the tastiest N.A. cocktail things out there.
[00:17:07] Ray Latif: It is. It's pretty remarkable. And one of my local Trader Joe's that doesn't sell alcohol, they've really made an intentional focus on promoting N.A. beverages and N.A. alternatives. And Recess has a pretty big presence in that set. So yeah, should be interesting to watch and congrats to Ben and his team. This is not an easy business and, you know, just the approach that he's taken. especially given that that brand, you know, could have fallen by the wayside and could have been sort of a cautionary tale about really focusing on one particular ingredient, a hot ingredient that is in CBD. But he's really navigated this industry in a pretty brilliant way with the addition of the mood enhancing beverages and the mocktails. And I remember when they launched the mocktails, it's like, what are you doing? seems like so out of place for what the brand is all about. And he's made it work.
[00:18:08] Jeffrey Klineman: So kudos to Ben and his team once again. Quick pause to let you know that the leading event for New Beverage industry is headed back to Los Angeles this December 6th through 8th. BevNET Live brings founders, investors, retailers, suppliers, and operators together for product discovery, high-value conversations, and partnerships that can shape what comes next. Early registration pricing is available now. Head to bevnetlive.com to register. Mark your calendar. Nosh Live is back December 3rd and 4th in Los Angeles. Join packaged food founders, buyers, investors, and operators for two days of product discovery and conversations focused on what's next. Early registration pricing is available now. Head to noshlive.com to register.
[00:19:05] Ray Latif: Okay. You all know the brand Tyka, right? At least in this room, we all know Tyka, which is the brand of functional coffees and One of the co-founders of that company has launched a new hot sauce. I don't know if I would call this innovative. It's probably an innovative approach to launching a product like this. The brand is called Burnrate. And John brought this to our attention, John Craven that is, last week. And Burn Rate is a pretty unique brand. They've only launched or they've only created 200 bottles of this hot sauce, which just looks like a, you know, typical one that you would find in a grocery store. Sold direct to consumer for $13.99 per five fluid ounce bottle. But I'm going to read from their website here. Turning cash into packaging you'll want to hold on to. I didn't know that John got shipped one of these.
[00:20:08] Jacqui Brugliera: I can't believe it.
[00:20:10] Ray Latif: And he just opened the package right next to me. Wow. And here it is right in front of us. This bottle of Burn Rate. May I? The box is really cool. Yeah, it looks nice. The box is like really high quality. It looks like a box like a iPod. You get an iPod. You get an iPhone. Yeah. But it looks worthy of a box that held a bottle that was wrapped with a hundred dollar bill It looks like a nicely bound book. Yeah, it's pretty good hot sauce as well, okay, so If John got bottle 71 of 200 yeah, these are individually numbered and this Appears to be a real hundred dollar bill. Yes.
[00:20:53] Melissa Traverse: I mean there's a little more to the story So Cal frees who created this he works for a company called Runway, which is like a B2B SaaS company, and this is... Huh? SaaS? Sorry, I forgot I need to explain everything in... No, there are some people that don't know what you're talking about. Software as a service. There you go. A common acronym. Derailed by that one. But no, it's basically, I think, a clever sort of marketing, almost lead generation tool for runway. And, you know, Cal told me basically that the margin in SaaS products is really good, obviously, and they can afford to create consumer products and, you know, use them to create buzz and awareness of what they're doing. And, uh, side note, he was, I think, sort of maybe less than subtly implying the cashflow to make CPG products from a CPG business was way better than it is for a CPG company to make. CPG products from his experience. But yeah, it's super catchy, cool. And yeah, the hot sauce, you can see I had a fair amount. It's pretty unique and tasty.
[00:22:10] Ray Latif: It better be for a bottle of $114 hot sauce.
[00:22:13] Melissa Traverse: What does it say? I think they have a flavor description on the front. Koji habanero hot sauce. Yeah, so it's got like a slight Asian kick to it, and it is spicy.
[00:22:23] Jacqui Brugliera: The Koji's really cool.
[00:22:24] Melissa Traverse: Yeah. I don't know. He thinks we're going to see more companies doing this, which I know at one point we had like the Sticker Mule hot sauce, but that was like a little different than this.
[00:22:33] Ray Latif: Yeah. Well, this is actually a collaboration between the company you mentioned, Runway, and Onama.
[00:22:39] Melissa Traverse: Yeah, I think that's just who makes the sauce.
[00:22:41] Ray Latif: Yes. Onama, or I might be mispronouncing it, Onima. Onima Pantry is the name of the brand, and they make a whole bunch of hot sauces. This one, again, is Koji habanero flavored. But, uh, yeah, so you can take the a hundred dollar bill. I guess you gotta be very careful because there is a label on top of the bill itself, the label for this brand Burn Rate. Yeah. So, uh, I guess I forgot to take a picture of it. You got to take a picture of this for the grams. Can I have the a hundred dollar bill?
[00:23:09] Jacqui Brugliera: So how much was it? It was a hundred and something dollars. It was $14. It was $14.
[00:23:14] Melissa Traverse: It was zero dollars for me. So I'm really, uh, you're rich. I'm coming out really good on this deal. And, uh, I mean, I don't know. I would have been happy for hot sauce alone. Maybe it's a fake hundred. Maybe he didn't give me a real hundred. No, it says on the website, it's a real hundred.
[00:23:30] Ray Latif: Maybe I didn't get a real hundred. Okay. Well, maybe Cal kept it for himself. If it is a real hundred, just to put listeners concerns at ease, we're going to donate that. We're going to donate.
[00:23:39] Melissa Traverse: I'm going to go by just. shots after shot of Jack Daniels to drown out all the sorrows of the samples that you never share with me. I just shared the Castorina samples.
[00:23:49] Ray Latif: These are delicious. I love these, by the way.
[00:23:51] Jacqui Brugliera: The $100 bill to me feels like mischief, like the mischief stunts. Remember those horse chips that mischief? Like it was it's sort of this like art collective that launches CPG products and they came out with Chips that tasted like horse meat.
[00:24:10] Ray Latif: Oh god. Oh How would you know it tastes like horse meat is the question? Yeah, I mean you can eat horse and Yeah, you can eat dog and you can eat lots of things but yeah I feel like I would eat it. I know I don't know I
[00:24:25] Jacqui Brugliera: I'm not going to look for it, but I feel like I, I don't know.
[00:24:30] Ray Latif: I would imagine you'd need to tenderize it quite a bit. And so, unless Jackie's going to puke. And you got to really hammer it. I'm just trying to make Jackie even more uncomfortable.
[00:24:42] Jacqui Brugliera: It's like I'm leaving.
[00:24:46] Ray Latif: You can't see her on the video because she's got her arms wrapped up, pulling back. Sorry, Jackie All right, well, you know we're talking about Runway we're talking about Burn Rate and that was the whole point of all that so okay cool stuff Can I mention another product?
[00:25:05] Melissa Traverse: Yeah, it's time to mention more from a a listener of ours. Yeah This is Ginger Bee.
[00:25:12] Jacqui Brugliera: I have it as well.
[00:25:12] Melissa Traverse: I'm gonna leave this jar with you rates unopened We have a couple jars But you might want this for your, your germ paranoia, but it's, it's basically like a ginger honey. That's meant to be turned into tea. So it's a little more like water soluble than regular old honey, but you take like a teaspoon or however much you want and you get this nice gingery kind of sweet, kind of spicy, tangy flavor currently in just like a standard, I don't know, sauce jar. It's a 15 ounce jar.
[00:25:45] Ray Latif: It looks like a jelly jar.
[00:25:46] Melissa Traverse: Yeah. So, I mean, I feel like there might be maybe a little positioning messaging work that needs to be done to make it really clear that this is meant as New Beverage, but really tasty stuff, high quality ingredients. So give that a try.
[00:26:00] Jacqui Brugliera: We talked to the, um, founder who came into the office in San Diego and I have it here with me too. Nice. We've been talking of like the evolution of this and maybe they go into stick packs. So it's more obvious that this is like a drink kind of mix, but it is really tasty. And it's inspired by, I believe it's like a Korean tea where it's a remedy, like house remedy that they use. It's also really good for your throat Ray. So before you get Apple Podcasts can lubricate.
[00:26:26] Speaker: Mm-hmm.
[00:26:27] Ray Latif: Well, I already lubricated with this olive oil shot.
[00:26:29] Jacqui Brugliera: You can just be super lubed.
[00:26:31] Ray Latif: It feels like this is a show where we're seeing a lot of crossover between food New Beverage, right? I mean, the olive oil shot, is it a food or New Beverage? The Ginger Bee tea is very much a jar of Well, it's very viscous liquid. It's not honey per se, but it's almost like a jam-ish. Yeah. You couldn't just drink this. I guess you possibly could, but you definitely need to mix it. And so where you put this in store, where you merchandise this product in particular, I think is another question for the brand and for retailers that carry the brand.
[00:27:06] Jacqui Brugliera: Right do you put it with honey, or do you put it with cold aids?
[00:27:10] Melissa Traverse: Yeah, yes, well. Here's a crossover of a different Ben Stiller soda Crossover being that it's made by the one and only Ben Stiller now tell us more about Ben Stiller. What famous movies? Jerry Stiller which you might remember from Seinfeld rest in peace sure it's in peace, and then I don't know greats like dodgeball
[00:27:34] Ray Latif: Dodgeball Dodgeball, I'm gonna go with there's something about Mary.
[00:27:38] Melissa Traverse: There you go the parents so many Royal Tenenbaums So yeah now he's got a got a soda brand which I think we talked about on another episode But I want I want Ray here to try it Brought you a freshly sterilized glass now.
[00:27:52] Ray Latif: We sure it's freshly sterilized. I Okay, so we got three flavors here. You get a lemon lime a root beer and a Shirley Temple. These are very reminiscent of an old-school Soda brand that I can't remember the name of they have a celery. What's the one with celery?
[00:28:07] Melissa Traverse: Dr. Brown's dr. Brown's these look like dr. Brown so it is it probably also looks a little bit like the slice yes, but yeah, I feel like this is a product for You know, I can be like, I've been drinking Stiller's since I was a kid. And it looks like it has been around for forever. Even the like font on the back. Yeah. You know, there's some little Nas, the world's refreshing-est soda on the top, which I don't think anyone would have put on a retro setup. 30 calories, no fake stuff. Yeah. I mean, it is kind of like elevated diet soda. I think the Dr. Brown's comparison, maybe slightly different flavors outside of the root beer, but yeah, it's got that nostalgia kind of taste to it.
[00:28:52] Ray Latif: Yeah, so the ingredients include organic cane sugar, in this case, organic root beer flavor. The things you might see, natural caramel color. This is sweetened with stevia as well. So, and monk fruit, excuse me, and monk fruit. Let's give it a whirl. Uh-oh. Almost nicked the laptop. Right, all over the laptop. Okay, there we go. This is their rut beer flavor, if I'm pronouncing it the way that Jackie pronounces it. Let's go.
[00:29:17] Speaker: Yep.
[00:29:18] Ray Latif: It's very good. You know, root beer can be very high in sugar and it's one of the reasons I don't drink root beer very often, but this is good. You're definitely getting, you know, some of the stevia and monk fruit, more stevia, but I can definitely see a lot of people drinking this with a cat's pastrami sandwich or. You know the classic New York deli hot dog from the side of the from the corner there you go. Why not yes? Why not all right well, Ben if you're listening We'd love to have you on the show just send me a note to ask at Taste Radio.com I'm not gonna give out my personal email address because I just feel like I don't want to give that out to you I don't really know you that well talk to my agent Talk to my agent. You didn't get that. You didn't do it right, right. Oh, have your people call my people. Is that what they say? We'll do lunch. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But no, no, in all seriousness, this is great stuff. And, um, anyone who knows Ben Stiller, it'd be great to, uh, to have you on the show, have the man on the show.
[00:30:12] Melissa Traverse: What I like about this last thing I'll say is there's no, there's like no learning curve. Sure. And sometimes products like that, it's just kind of what's needed, I think, especially for soda.
[00:30:22] Ray Latif: Obviously the hard part is going to be distribution and why people should carry this over anything else and whether or not most people associate this brand with the actor himself and whether that moves the needle. Is someone going to say, Hey, well, I'm going to drink this soda because Ben Stiller's behind it. Does anyone care? I don't know. So a lot to consider.
[00:30:42] Jacqui Brugliera: Are those the only three SKUs, the Lemon Lime, the Root Beer and the Shirley Temple?
[00:30:47] Melissa Traverse: I don't know. I believe so for right now, yes. Okay.
[00:30:50] Jacqui Brugliera: I like that they have Shirley Temple in there. That's an unusual third skew, but it's interesting and different. And I don't know, who doesn't love a Shirley Temple?
[00:30:59] Ray Latif: Yeah. Again, I can see this all over, you know, New York City, all the boroughs will be carrying this. Is this going to work in Walmart in Idaho? Maybe, maybe. All right. Let's continue. What do you got there, Melissa? You got something interesting. What is that?
[00:31:15] Jacqui Brugliera: Yeah, so I finally tried these Magic Spoon protein treats. Does anybody want to try one of these?
[00:31:21] Ray Latif: So Magic Spoon, best known for their ultra premium cereals that are 10 bucks and above.
[00:31:28] Jacqui Brugliera: Unless you get them at Market Basket.
[00:31:30] Ray Latif: How much are they at Market Basket?
[00:31:31] Jacqui Brugliera: I think they're $7.99. Ooh, a steal. Yeah, a total steal. Yeah, these are 12 grams of protein, 1 gram of sugar, 140 calories. It's crispy rice, similar to like a mezcla bar. And I thought they were really tasty. And I do like that consistency of protein bar that's, you know, a little bit crunchy instead of just that thick brick of protein mass. So I thought these were pretty tasty. I also, I don't know, I feel like I like protein bars as like a treat. Like if you're looking for something sweet, but don't necessarily want to eat dessert. I feel like these fit that bill pretty well. Is it almost like a Rice Krispie treat, but like better?
[00:32:14] Speaker: Yeah.
[00:32:14] Jacqui Brugliera: Well, I mean, I feel like that might, if you're looking for a rice crispy treat, I feel like this might not totally satiate you in that way, but it does have that consistency. Like I've, to me, it was very similar to Mbez Clubar, which I think is one of my absolute favorite bars overall. But yeah, I thought these were tasty.
[00:32:33] Ray Latif: Yeah, definitely not a thick brick. People should use that description more often. If you don't want a thick brick for a snack, try these Magic Spoon protein treats described as a high protein cereal bar. All right, Jackie, what else? What do you got over there?
[00:32:49] Jacqui Brugliera: I've been drinking Alkaline Coffee Company. So I know we've been talking about like coffee a lot, energy a lot. Where do you go from here? And this is kind of another take. This is a non-acidic cold brew coffee. So it's all about, you know, not upsetting your stomach, which I think some people have found with coffee and a reason why they've gone away from it. So this is all about just being non-acidic and mineral treated. And this is a new brand. Yeah, mineral treated. I don't know.
[00:33:18] Melissa Traverse: Fancy way of saying that's how they got to the pH they want in the water.
[00:33:24] Jacqui Brugliera: It sounds exciting to me. I just like hearing that.
[00:33:28] Melissa Traverse: I mean, low acid coffee has been around for like forever. I'm not really sure that I can recall someone doing that with a bottled product though.
[00:33:37] Jacqui Brugliera: Yeah, I feel like that's the first time I've seen it. And also it's just like so front of pack, like just alkaline. Yeah. Whereas usually it's alkaline water, not Alkaline Coffee. Right.
[00:33:49] Ray Latif: Well, our table here is a bit of a mess, which is a good thing. I feel like it means that we're doing our job and tasting a lot of products and talking about a lot of products. We love new products. So if you have something that you could send us, please do. You can find our addresses on our websites, BevNET.com or Nosh.com. If you still can't find it, just send us an email to AskAtTasteRadio.com. Just Google it. Just Google it. AskChatGPT. There you go. You could do that too. AskSiri. I don't know. And if you're very kind, you'll send samples to both the San Diego office and the Newton office. I know that could be kind of expensive, but we don't want to leave out our, to your colleagues in San Diego. Do not send them to the Brookline office if Ray asks. Oh, okay. That's not a real thing. That's not an option. It's not an option, right. But I also want to mention that if you're thinking about sending this product, it's probably because you listen to the show on a regular basis and you like the show. And if you like the show, I would please ask that you review it on the Apple Podcasts app. It's pretty easy to do so on your phone. You go to the Taste Radio page, you scroll all the way down. And where you can give us a five-star review, you just hit five stars. If you want to leave a review. Leave a review. And if you want a free t-shirt for doing said things, well, just take a screenshot of that review. Send us a note to askatasteradio.com with your address and your preferred t-shirt size, and you will have the softest, most beautiful t-shirt you'll ever own in your mailbox in about a week.
[00:35:21] Jacqui Brugliera: You'll never take it off.
[00:35:22] Ray Latif: You'll never take it off. They'll bury you in it.
[00:35:25] Speaker: Yes.
[00:35:26] Jacqui Brugliera: Can I give a shout out to someone who's sending samples, but they didn't arrive before the show?
[00:35:31] Ray Latif: It's not how it works, Melissa. I think I think it's fine. Yes, go ahead.
[00:35:37] Jacqui Brugliera: Anna Baskin, the founder High Tail Beverage. It's a low dose THC beverage geared towards women. She is sending over samples of the cocoa pomegranate yuzu flavor, which I did try at BevNET Live and it's absolutely delicious. She was just on the non-based podcast with Angus Wittenberg of Wink. And I'm so excited for those to show up. So thank you, Anna.
[00:36:01] Ray Latif: We'll be on the lookout for those and hopefully we'll get to try them in an upcoming episode of Taste Radio. That brings us to the end of this episode of Taste Radio. Thank you so much for listening. Taste Radio is a production of BevNET.com, Incorporated. Our audio engineer for Taste Radio is Joe Cracci. Our technical director is Joshua Pratt, and our video editor is Ryan Galang. Our social marketing manager is Amanda Smerlinski, and our designer is Amanda Huang. Just a reminder, if you like what you hear on Taste Radio, please share the podcast with friends and colleagues. And of course, we would love it if you could review us on the Apple Podcasts app or your listening platform of choice. Check us out on Instagram. Our handle is bevnettasteradio. As always, for questions, comments, ideas for future podcasts, please send us an email to ask at Taste Radio.com. On behalf of the entire Taste Radio team, thank you for listening, and we'll talk to you next time.
[00:36:57] Melissa Traverse: you
[00:37:09] Ray Latif: VIP has quietly powered New Beverage industry for more than 50 years, trusted by more than 2,800 distributors and 1,400 suppliers. They have defined this industry time and again, and in this era of AI, they're leading the way. Today, we're joined by VIP CEO, Andrew Krizis, and Head of Sales, Lucinda Aquat, to discuss where the industry is headed and what customers can expect next. Andrew, it's great to see you. How are you? Good. Thanks for having me, Ray. Lucinda, how are you?
[00:37:39] Jeffrey Klineman: So great. Excited to be here.
[00:37:41] Ray Latif: Yes. And our audience is excited to hear about VIP's capabilities with AI because it is a topic that is top of mind for so many founders at this point. Andrew, as I mentioned, VIP has been around for over 50 years. Your background is pretty interesting because you bring so much to the table as CEO. How did you come to VIP?
[00:38:02] John McKenna: Yeah, great question, Ray. And I think it does go back to the legacy of VIP. So I'm incredibly passionate about New Beverage and alcohol industry, the broader CPG industry as a whole. So I spent the last 12 years plus working at Nielsen IQ, working with many of the suppliers that could be listening to this, distributors and retailers. And it was about five years ago that I first interacted with VIP and it's actually a partner to Nielsen IQ. And so complimentary partnership was created and I got to know the company a little bit. I got to see the value of what VIP creates in the industry and how it helps support the three-tier system. And I was just blown away also by the people. by just the caliber of the talent, how respected they were in the industry, how much knowledge they had across the three-tier system. And so once I started to get to know the company a bit more, I saw just the opportunity for the technology to do so much more across the industry. And with AI, as we were talking about, becoming really important and accelerating every day, every week. I started to realize it's a huge moment for AI and technology and more investment to come into VIP, really help our clients, help the suppliers, help the distributors and retailers, and transform how operations and the day-to-day work is getting done. So I just saw that as a great opportunity, both in the technology and AI side, leveraging all of my data background and knowledge in the industry, but then joining a group that has an amazing culture, an amazing team, and a ton of passion behind it.
[00:39:21] Ray Latif: Lucinda, when you came to VIP, you also came with a ton of experience. Just talk a bit about your background in this industry.
[00:39:28] Jeffrey Klineman: Yeah, thanks, Ray. So I like to say I was born and raised in the beer business, but I got here as soon as I could, started when I was 21 with Boston Beer Company. I've worked in all three tiers of the three-tier supply chain over the last 20 years. And I showed up to the first day to the VIP office here in Burlington, and I felt like I should be asking for autographs because VIP is the only set of data and the only set of tools that I've ever used on any of the three tiers. So it was really remarkable to see the team of people that has built such an incredible organization and really built from the ground up over the past 50 plus years that VIPs existed. So I'm honored to be here, a part of the team now to help carry the sales team into the future with all this new agentic work that we're going to talk about.
[00:40:14] Ray Latif: Andrew, let's just start off by talking about where New Beverage industry is headed right now in broad terms and why AI is such a critical strategic investment for founders and businesses.
[00:40:24] John McKenna: You know, I think about whether you're a small supplier or distributor or a large supplier, you know, New Beverage alcohol space. You could be only have a few people at your company or hundreds. At the end of the day, everyone's looking for efficiency, whether you're three people within your company and you're stretching yourself to try to do five jobs. Or again, you're a larger company with maybe 10 people in the finance department. You're all trying to find better ways to do what you're doing so you can drive more product to consumers. So AI is just coming at this perfect moment over the last six to 12 months where everyone needs it. Everyone needs it for similar reasons, for inefficiencies, whether it's helping you run some reporting, it's helping you with pricing, it's helping you optimize something. At the end of the day, there's never enough hands and arms within a company when you're building a brand. And I've experienced that, you know, working with hundreds and hundreds of founders over the last 12 years in my past role with Nielsen IQ. And I see that with VIP. So I think all of the industry, both suppliers, distributors, retailers, are looking at AI to try to understand how can I drive more efficiency? How can I drive a better delivery of my service or product to the end customer? And how can I do it in a way that's going to set me up for success? But now many people are taking it in different ways. You know, AI isn't something that's just intuitive and you throw on a chat bot and all of a sudden you're up and running. So it's really interesting to see how suppliers are leveraging AI, how distributors are leveraging AI, retailers, et cetera. And there's some fun nuances between those three.
[00:41:47] Ray Latif: When it comes to spending money on AI or otherwise, founders want to see a return on investment. And I'm curious about how you measure return on investment when it comes to AI. And also, there's so much hype about AI at this point. Where does hype meet reality? Lucinda, can you tackle both questions for me?
[00:42:05] Jeffrey Klineman: Yeah, great questions. So I think I'll tackle the ROI question first, because I think it will address the buzzword as well. But I think when you think about AI, I was thinking back to all these different technological advances and how they've impacted the industry all the way back to when we used to have rolls of quarters to get on the payphone, and then all of a sudden, cell phones helped to make us more efficient. Same thing with printers, and then the internet, I think of AI in the same way. It will give us the ability to enable all of our teams to be that much faster, that much smarter, smarter by way of better insights from the data. So if we're able to take a sales report, a sales ranker, and extract out the insights that much faster and distill down to the actual accounts we should be spending our time in, that to me is an instant ROI. There's also back of house applications. We think we talked with our distributors about some of the features that are most important to them as we're building out our new agentic platform. And it's things like avoiding the fat finger on the order. We don't want 10, we want one. We don't want 100, we want 10. And so giving the teams the ability to capture those things in advance, I think is where we see the ROI. It also empowers our retailers to make better orders. So think of predictive ordering in an e-commerce platform like Connect. There is so many great things that we can do to empower across all three of the tiers using all of our agentic features that we have in place now. So if I'm a retailer, if I'm a distributor, if I'm a supplier, that's how I think about the ROI. And it really enables the humans to be better at their jobs. So that in itself, I think is the buzz. I encourage people to think about AI as more of a tool and a way to do their business, a way to go about seeking the outcomes they're looking for versus this buzzword of a tool. And I think when we all begin to embrace it much more, we'll see that firsthand as well.
[00:43:59] Ray Latif: Obviously, technology is moving faster than it ever has before, and it's incumbent upon VIP to provide technology that is keeping up with the times, or in this case, keeping up by the day.
[00:44:10] John McKenna: Yeah, I think you're spot on with it's evolving every day, every week, new models come out, Babel 5 came out for the second time. So it's a constant. It's been great. I've had a few conversations just recently with some distributors and suppliers. And when we talk about the investments, one of the things that came out clearly from our clients was they are interested, they are getting pressure to use AI. And so initially, you know, whether you're a founder on this call, a supplier or distributor, the thought process was, let's just take Jet, GPT, let's take Claude, let's just turn it on for everyone. And like, let's go get some insights. And you can get some gains and insights there. But ultimately, those clients came to us and said, hey, for us really to take advantage of this new technology and capability, we need VIP. We need VIP to do this within all the business processes, because VIP is so foundational to the core operations, whether you're a distributor, whether you're on the supplier side, looking at your inventory and depletions. And so that's where we took it upon ourselves to say, let's look at the marketplace. Let's look at all the different providers out there and take a hard look at ourselves. And we made the decision to make a really sizable, significant investment into a new architecture with AI and an agentic first decision. And what that allows us to do is actually create not just agents and AI on top of legacy products, which again, that still adds some value, but it doesn't change the game. And so we said, let's go down the path of actually building for the next several years, not for the next two months or three months, because a new model is to proceed something, but we need to have a new foundation. So VIPs made the biggest investment or one of the biggest investments we've ever made as a company. And that's gonna allow us to have an agentic first platform, bring in many different types of data and create agents on top that again, aren't just giving you some insights, but I like to say are doing work. They're doing work for you as a supplier. They're actually making decisions on your behalf within certain guardrails. And then they're able to communicate for you. If you're a supplier, actually having these agents do work for you, communicate to your distributors, to your trading partners on your behalf. Again, I go back to my first point. Everyone needs more arms and hands, right? You never have enough people when you're a small player or a large player. And so actually being able to do some of that work, communicate digitally to distributors, whether it's pricing, whether it's something related to inventory, whether it's shipments. And likewise, distributors having agents that can interpret and engage and make decisions on their behalf and then communicate to their trading partners. That's where we're going as VIP with AI. We think we play a really central role into that core operational element of how the three tier system works. But we were also cognizant that that takes real investment. It's not just lipstick on an existing product and putting in a chat bot and saying, oh, everything's AI. It's really looking at the foundation of what's needed So much has changed just in the last six months, where whether you're a software or data company, what you had built maybe two years ago, even 12 months ago, almost becomes irrelevant from an architectural standpoint, just because the last six months. So that level of investment is something we're fully driving towards and working with a lot of clients on both the distributor and supplier side of how we bring this new platform to life. And at the same time, though, we're still investing in our existing products. That is not stopping. So I think of it from a VIP standpoint, as we're going down both paths, we're investing in existing products, putting AI on top, kind of what I was mentioning with many others in the industry. But we're also going after this whole new architecture and whole new platform. And that's what's really required long term of the three tier system.
[00:47:34] Ray Latif: Whenever I talk to founders, operators about how they choose their partners, it really comes down to trust. And I think when you're talking about AI and the evolution of this technology, it's really important to trust your partner. And it seems like the level of expertise that you guys can provide to companies is just unmatched at this point. So I highly encourage folks to get in touch with the team at VIP. Lucinda, what's the best way to do so?
[00:48:02] Jeffrey Klineman: Yeah, thanks, Ray. We are so excited to hear from all our customers. We're getting questions every day, and I do think the best way to reach out to us is vapinsights.com, and go and submit a form, request a demo, send in a question, and we will be able to get back to you. But our sales team is talking with all of our customers all day, every day about this, and we're really excited to bring everyone more.
[00:48:23] Ray Latif: Outstanding. Well, Andrew, Lucinda, thank you so much for taking the time. I'm really excited for the future of AI and VIP's ability to help companies address this technology in a really effective way. So thanks again, and let's definitely stay in touch. Great. Thanks for having us, Ray.
[00:48:38] Jeffrey Klineman: Thank you, Ray.
