A Company That Coca-Cola Killed Off Is Making A Comeback
Coca-Cola recently killed off one of its much-loved brands, however, that brand is now making a surprising comeback.
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Recently, Coca-Cola has been putting an immense focus on streamlining and enhancing its beverage portfolio. From introducing new flavors to axing underperforming brands the company is focusing hard on ensuring the future success of Coca-Cola and its subsidiaries. Honest Tea was one of the casualties of Coke’s strategic business plan. The dissolution of the Honest Tea brand did not sit well with the company’s original founder Seth Goldman. Goldman is now focusing on developing and launching a successor to his now-defunct tea brand.
In the wake of Honest Tea’s demise, Goldman was able to raise $14.5 billion to create another tea product. Goldman was able to acquire the funding via his and his business partner Spike Mendelsohn’s current company called Eat The Change. Goldman and Mendelsohn also worked with Collaborative Fund and S2G Ventures in their effort to raise money.
The successor to Honest Tea will be called Just Iced Tea. Thanks to Goldman’s rapid action, consumers likely won’t have to wait too long to see it on shelves either. Goldman started the initiative to creatively bring Honest Tea back in June. Now, Goldman says if everything goes according to plan it could be mere weeks before Just Iced Tea starts appearing in stores.
Goldman’s current company, Eat The Change, abruptly refocused following the news that Coca-Cola would be discontinuing Honest Tea. Before the revelation that Honest Tea was destined for demise, Eat The Change was concentrating on developing a plant-based mushroom jerky, as well as other plant-based edibles. Now, Goldman is giving his all to getting Just Iced Tea off the ground. A mission that he says was largely motivated by public response.
Back in June, Goldman told Business Insider that he had no intentions of getting back into the beverage industry. However, when he posted about the dissolution of Honest Tea on social media, the public’s outcry made it obvious to him that a product like Honest Tea should not have been slapped the way it was. “It really reinforced what I had hoped: That this thing really means a lot to a lot of people — not just the employees, not just the retailers and distributors, but consumers,” highlighted Goldman.
Moreover, Goldman just might be in the best position to bring Honest Tea back, in the form of Just Iced Tea that is. Not only was he the original founder of the brand, but much of the staff at Eat The Change followed Goldman over from their days at Honest Tea. Those folks have a unique relationship with the brand and understand it in ways that are unique to those who were there at the brand’s very inception. That kind of built-in knowledge is a wonderful asset to leverage as Just Iced Tea succeeds Honest Tea.
Honest Tea was lucky. Its former founder was still not only passionate about his product, but he had the means to revive it. Many other small brands are suffering the same fate as Goldman’s brand with no likelihood of revival. Coca-Cola, for instance, has also since stopped production of Zico, Coconut Water, Odwalla Smoothies, and Hubert’s Lemonade.
