Brands are increasingly using modern bio-technology to develop ‘next generation’ fermented functional beverages, researchers say, but they warn that many drinks still face challenges prior to possible commercialization.
Bottled water, energy and iced tea are expected to win big in 2014 as C-store operators predict a ‘banner year’ in packaged beverages led by brands including Sparkling Ice, Monster and Lipton.
Brainwave Drinks insists it’s targeting anyone with a brain and says the drink will appeal to consumers as keen on maintaining a healthy mind as warding off Alzheimer’s or dementia.
The most successful ‘beauty shot’ on the UK market Pure Gold Collagen has been rapped by the Advertising Standards Authority for making ‘implied beauty and appearance claims’.
Big Interview: Drazil Kids Tea founder Christine Wheeler
The CEO of Drazil Kids Tea thinks this unusually named (lizard spelled backwards!), ready-to-drink tea brand has what it takes to become the industry leader in the growing tea for kids segment.
Steve Hills, European contract manufacturing director, reveals ambitious six-year plan
PepsiCo Europe says it plans to grow the size of its contract manufacturing business six-fold in as many years to accelerate food and beverage innovation and boost productivity.
INDUSTRY VOICES: ADOMAS PRANEVICIUS, MYDRINK BEVERAGES/DRINKPRENEUR
Adomas Pranevicius, general manager of MyDrink Beverages tells BeverageDaily.com readers how to choose the right contract manufacturer for their product – and why it's vital to assess everything from capabilities to communications and returns policies.
Consumers are tired of bars, says quinoa 'snack in a bottle' founder
While a scary percentage of new food & beverage brands end up quietly disappearing when their backers run out of cash, luck, or endurance, a small number succeed. But what distinguishes the winners from the losers?
When consumers think about GMOs, they tend to contrast them with “some hypothetical alternative food that is pristine”, when in most cases, going ‘non-GMO’ just means returning to a food production system that is less efficient - and worse for the environment...
The head of Tesco’s soft drinks buying team David Beardmore has urged aspiring brands not to turn up at the retailer’s HQ with a lengthy PowerPoint presentation but to do something different.
Our intrepid journalists sample interesting new beverage brands – to find out if the taste, texture, packaging and branding is up to scratch, or should be scratched off. Rebel Kitchen is up this week.
A judge has dismissed a lawsuit against Hain Celestial over the marketing of its BluePrint high-pressure-processed (HPP) juices on the grounds that the plaintiff derailed his own case by submitting scientific papers to the court which contradicted his...
THE BEVERAGEDAILY BASEMENT TAPES: CHRIS HANNAWAY, OVERLY SPORTS DRINK
Young entrepreneur Chris Hannaway and childhood friend Will Hammersley launched frozen yogurt brand Arctic Farm into Sainsbury’s at the tender age of 19. Now they’re back with sports drink Overly. This is Chris’s story…
THE BIG INTERVIEW: Matt Rompala, Avery Dennison, product and business development manager, wine & spirits
Avery Dennison tells BeverageDaily.com that beer, wine and spirits brands are increasingly looking for shorter-run labels that bring them a more emotive one-on-one connection with a given consumer.
Beverage Grades analyzes the 'DNA' of wine to identify cheaper bottles that taste almost identical to your favorites and its founders agree the technology should encourage US wineries to raise standards.
Archer Daniels Midland CEO Patricia Woertz insists that WILD Flavors' beverage and taste expertise complement her firm’s expertise in food ingredients and know-how in texture, function and nutrition.
Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) will buy WILD Flavors for €2.3bn citing fast-growing demand for natural food and beverage flavors and ingredients as the rationale.
The US food and beverage industry anticipates continued sales growth in 2014 on the heels of strong performances the past two years, according to the second annual "US Food & Beverage Industry Study" from accounting, tax and advisory services...
Wine Vision organizer Andrew Reed insists a heritage-rich wine world must transform to tap the ‘radically different demands’ of millennials, ahead of the 2014 event where the president of Moët Hennessy will speak.
PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi says she didn’t want a short-term ‘cut, slash and burn’ policy that would have seen the company make enormous earnings from 2006 despite the upset her long-term nutritional foods focus caused some investors.
NESTLE PRUNES US BEVERAGE PORTFOLIO, INKS COFFEE-MATE DEAL WITH KEURIG
Brynwood Partners has bought Nestlé USA brand Juicy Juice for a multi-million dollar deal and reportedly insists the brand can still be hugely successful in a troubled juice category the Swiss multinational has jumped out of.
US sales of specialty foods & beverages topped $88.3bn in 2013, up an astonishing 47% since 2008. To find out what all the fuss is about and get up to speed with the latest beverage trends, from tart cherries to blossom water, FoodNavigator-USA headed...
Innocent Drinks co-founder Richard Reed says aspiring entrepreneurs need to ensure they’ve got a ‘drink that the world genuinely wants in packaging that’s beautiful, distinctive and that works’.
Starbucks will launch ‘handcrafted’ Fizzio soft drinks in US cafes this summer, and one analyst says the brand represents ‘potential for bubbles everywhere’ and thinks the Seattle chain and Pepsi may take it to grocery stores.
Exotic and functional fruits and vegetables like cashew nut fruit, chu chu and their extracts are set for an easier passage into European Union markets if mooted simplifications to EU Novel Foods laws come to fruition, according to a UK-based expert.
Tate & Lyle has poached PepsiCo executive Nick Hampton to serve as its new CFO and one analyst says he must transition from branded goods to a more ‘commodity-influenced B2B model’.
Starbucks-owned brand Evolution Fresh is test marketing a new range of co-branded smoothies made with cold pressed, high pressure processed juice and Dannon Greek yogurt in 200 Starbucks stores in San Jose and St Louis.
Following on the success of ReishiSmooth, a trademarked all-natural fermentation process that uses mushrooms to remove the bitterness from chocolate and coffee, food technology firm MycoTechnology is betting on the nutritional appeal of green coffee extract...
Will Keurig Cold really turn the soft drinks market on its head? Can natural sweeteners pull diet soda out of its funk? And what’s the next coconut water?
Tesco’s top soft drinks buyer has tipped collagen-based beauty drinks for the top despite the lack of EFSA-approved health claims in the area, after startup Bella Berry caused a stir last week in London.
The Honest brand could extend well beyond the ready-to-drink tea category into a wider array of beverages and even foods, says the co-founder of Honest Tea, which posted a 27% surge in sales to $112m in 2013, and is growing even faster this year.
LONG BEACH CONVENTION CENTER, CALIFORNIA (MAY 29-31)
Join us on a whirlwind tour of the Healthy Beverage and World Tea Expos, as we train our lens on five rising beverage brands addressing need states from enhanced hydration to digestive health.
Moms remain the traditional guardians of their kids’ diets, and Little Me Tea founder Melinda Hicks tells us the rise of moms turned beverage entrepreneurs is as natural as her products.
Daily consumption of half a cup of a broccoli sprout beverage increased participants' ability to excrete the carcinogen benzene and lung irritant acrolein, according to research in China.
Coca-Cola has confirmed that the sugar level in its new stevia-sweetened beverage Coca-Cola Life may vary considerably in different markets, with the UK version containing a lot more calories than the version sold in Argentina, for example. Meanwhile,...
Natural and organic is the future of functional food and food in general, according to MetaBrandCEO Eric Schnell. Schnell is a panelist in an upcoming NutraIngredients-USA online forum title "Trends in Functional Foods" and set for June 30.
MILLER COORS ADMITS COORS BANQUET USES ‘LIQUID CORN ADJUNCT’
Miller Coors faces calls to disclose more data about the ingredients used in beer brands including Coors Banquet, after publishing a ‘transparent’ ingredients list that does not specifiy that corn used therein is actually a 'liquid corn adjunct'.
'OUR LABELS COMPLY WITH ALL LAWS & GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS': CAMPBELL'S
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) today threatened to sue Campbell's Soup Company alleging that it makes misleading statements about the juice content, nutritional value and healthfulness of V8 juices sold in the US.
Green-tea based drinks brand OOb took first prize at the inaugural DrinkPreneur event in London yesterday, winning high praise from judges including Tesco soft drinks buying manager David Beardmore.
Green tea can drive brain-health drinks to new levels, writes Euromonitor International senior health and wellness analyst, Diana Cowland, in this guest article.
Charbrew founder Adam Soliman tells BeverageDaily.com his entrepreneurial brand is keen to take on Unilever iced tea Lipton with a healthier UK alternative launched into Holland & Barrett this week.
FIRST BOTTLED DRINKS LAUNCHED BY US CIDERIES INCLUDING REVEREND NAT'S HARD CIDER
The founder of Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider reveals that rustic pineapple-based street beverage tepache was the cidery's most successful launch ever, but doubts it will be the ‘next big thing’ in America.
Investment from Swire, The Coca-Cola Company, Danone and ALPLA
Avantium has closed a financing round of $50m from a consortium including Swire Pacific, The Coca-Cola Company, DANONE, ALPLA, and existing shareholders to advancing PEF packaging material.
Amidst headlines over high sugar levels in juice, 89% of Americans believe the natural sugars therein are good for them, according to a YouGov poll of 2,000 people commissioned by Jamba Juice.
Rebel Kitchen CEO Tamara Arbib insists she wants to make health food accessible and fun as the coconut milk-based beverage brand wins listings in major UK grocery chains including Waitrose and Ocado.
Vital Juice CEO Edward Balassanian insists the product is outselling larger rivals including Hain Celestial’s BluePrint he says evangelize nutrition in juice that only his brand delivers.
Starbucks bought Teavana for $620m in 2012 and plans to take tea upmarket in the States, but one investor warns the price of success may be depressed margins and earnings.
Wayne Lutomski from Welch’s Foods has hit out at ‘experts’ who describe sugar as a poison and says they don’t know what they’re talking about, as he defends the health and wellness benefits of 100% juice.
