We’ve seen sweeping changes throughout the CPG industry as large brands try to adapt to the changing consumer preferences. It’s no secret that consumers are concerned now more than ever on what they’re putting into their bodies. First things first: consumers are increasingly turning to products that offer clean, natural ingredients. As important as the ingredients themselves are, consumers also crave transparency in disclosing these ingredients. Yet, at the end of the day, consumers will always demand a tasty product. This perfect storm of quality, transparency, and taste has left big players scratching their heads, wondering how they can introduce products with a transparent nutritional label they’re proud of while maintaining high quality taste profiles.
From day one, we kept these stringent consumer preferences top of mind when we embarked on the mission to formulate BOMANI. We here at BOMANI emphasize transparency as a key pillar in all we do, and that starts with the ingredients that we use in our products. While a vast majority of alcohol brands shy away from revealing what they put into their products, we proudly promote our nutritional panel. BOMANI only has 110 calories, 0g carbs, and 0g sugar – all while being Kosher, gluten-free, and dairy free. Our beans are 100% ethically sourced Arabica coffee beans and all of our ingredients are natural. As an ex-college athlete, I personally love the fact that BOMANI is only 4 ingredients: 100% ethically sourced Arabica coffee beans, water, alcohol from sugar and natural flavors.
With Sam, Amin, Dustin and I all coming from finance backgrounds, we are very data driven. One of the first things we realized when setting out to create BOMANI was that we were marrying the two fastest growing categories in the entire beverage industry: hard seltzer (we use the same alcohol base) and cold brew coffee. The hard seltzer industry has exploded like nothing the alcohol industry has ever seen – as recently as two years ago, the entire hard seltzer industry only had ~$100mm in sales. This year, they’re projecting over $4bn in sales!* Similarly, the cold brew industry has grown at triple digit growth rates for the past few years and is expected to continue going forward.
We drew up a Venn diagram between these categories to dissect each of their qualities and ultimately understand what was driving this growth. The alcohol space historically has followed the trends in the non-alcohol space, so it made sense that the hard seltzer space exploded after seeing the steady growth in the seltzer space through the likes of La Croix. Cold Brew coffee was the next evolution of the coffee industry as people started looking for RTD (ready-to-drink) products for their convenience, its rich flavor profile, and being 67% less acidic than normal coffee.
The trait that products in both categories shared was that they were the next evolution in the Better-For-You category. According to Forbes, 81% of Better-For-You consumers look at the nutritional panel and 30% of the consumers look for their products to limit their calories for them. Hard Seltzers capitalized on this trend – they were some of the first products in the alcohol space to highlight their nutritional panel, advertising that these products only had ~100 calories and lower sugars and carbs as well. This, in part, explains the significant “beyond beer” shift in the alcohol industry, an initiative that reflects shifting consumer behavior, as they move away from beer and towards products such as hard seltzers, hard kombuchas, and now hard coffees as well. A similar shift occurred in the non-alc. space as well; as consumers who were once grabbing a soda for a midday caffeine kick, no longer are. These consumers are now grabbing a cold brew coffee as a clean, naturally occurring form of energy. Soda consumption is now at its lowest selling rate in 30 years- I know I haven’t had a soda since 8th grade. Our SoCal Field Sales Manager, Jack Morgenson, hasn’t either – both for these reasons above as well as other dietary restrictions.
BOMANI Cold Buzz is marrying your 2 favorite things: caffeine and alcohol – and we worked incredibly hard to do that in a healthier, tastier, and more convenient form than ever before. We’re here to tell you that you no longer need to make the choice between the better tasting option vs. the healthier option, because BOMANI Cold Buzz combines these options, providing consumers with a smooth, clean tasting alcohol-infused cold brew coffee, housed in a sleek black can.
