HERE IS ANOTHER, MEN LET ME TELL YOU RNVO IS GOING TO BE A HUGE,THE MARKET IS UNLIMITED AND WE THE S/H WILL BE REWARDED VERY SOON.: Vital Lifestyle Water: Water Upgraded
Written by Jennifer Cirillo
Friday, 13 June 2008
There is always some level of uncertainty when launching a new beverage—no matter how big or small the company. So for Paul Paterson, president of Big Earth Brands Ltd., the parent company of Vital Lifestyle Water, which Paterson also is the president of, it was important to focus on the “facts” when coming up with the vitamin enhanced water.
vital water“We know that the functional beverage category reached US$10.8 billion in 2007,” Paterson says. “We know that it is the fastest-growing beverage segment in the United States right now. We know that two-thirds of all Americans are overweight or obese and we know that almost 30 percent of all Americans’ calories come by way of beverage.”
As a result of those “facts,” Big Earth Brands, based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, has come to market with a beverage, Vital Lifestyle Water, that it feels can address those issues.
Described by Paterson as “a 100 percent all-natural, ultra-low in calories, truly functional water with a hint of all natural fruit extract flavor,” Vital is positioned as a bottled water that gives consumers more for their money’s worth with a suggested retail price of US$1.39 to US$1.69—competitively priced with other bottled water brands that offer added vitamins. But don’t think of Vital as a “me too” product, says Paterson, because it isn’t. Think of it as an upgrade.
“We are trying to upgrade the bottled water consumer,” says Paterson. “We hold ourselves to a higher standard.” That is partially because the NHP (Natural Health Products), Canada’s regulatory body, requires natural products, in short, to contain the minimum amount of a supplement without exceeding the maximum amount allowed.
Aside from mandated regulations, Paterson believes, “if you are going to call yourself a water, you should look like a water, you should taste like a water, and above all else, you should be healthy like a water.” In fact, the company calls attention to its competitors and asks consumers to take a close look at the beverages they are consuming through the marketing slogan: “If you think all vitamin waters are created equal, you are missing some Vital information.”
“I think the big thing is really highlighting how we are different in the marketplace and challenging people to really look at what they are drinking on a day-to-day basis—to show them that there are options in this space that weren’t available to them before,” Paterson says.
The differentiating points of Vital Lifestyle Water are:
• It uses Fruit Up Premium, a natural sweetener from Valencia, Spain, which is made from a blend of “clear fruit” (grapes and apples) extracts and scores low on the glycemic index with a rating of 34. (It is the first beverage in North America to do so, according to the company.)
• It is low in calories with 15 calories per serving, 37.5 calories per bottle.
• Each serving provides up to one-quarter of the recommended daily intake of B3, B5, B6 and B12 vitamins.
Two years in the making, Vital’s product line includes seven “functions” with a hint of fruit flavor: Defense (blood orange); Calm (lemon-lime); Control (açaí berry); Tune-Up (blueberry, pomegranate, açaí); IQ (yumberry); Energize (dragon fruit) and Shine (citrus starfruit). In each of the beverages, three supplements are added to deliver on what the label promises. For example, Calm has supplements of chamomile, lemon balm and passion flower to help relieve day-to-day stresses. IQ has L-tyrosine, choline and ginko biloba to stimulate brainpower.
Paterson knows that even though beverages that fall under the health and wellness/functionality umbrella are growing in popularity with consumers, they are skeptical of new products and are looking for true innovation.
“The big challenge for us is conveying to the consumer all of the supreme benefits we have in this product,” he says. One way the company is conveying its message is through its label, which features a description of the drink’s formulation, noting its caloric content, three supplements and its benefit.
“It’s (about) convincing a consumer that what we are claiming here is real,” Paterson says.
Vital launched in Canada in November 2006 and soon after launched in the US where today about 95 percent of the product is sold. Vital is being distributed in eight states—California, Nevada, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina—with New York expected to become the ninth state this month. As of June 1, Vital will be sold in Super Targets across the country, the company reports, and it is also expected to be available at amazon.com this month.
Also in the pipeline is a brand extension. Vital Action, a performance water, is expected to launch in July in all of Vital Lifestyle Water’s existing markets. The performance water targets action sports enthusiasts. Vital Action will come in seven flavors, and will address four different functionalities: stamina (arginine); immunity (echinacea); recovery (N-acetyl-L-cysteine (NAC)) and energy (ginseng). It has 100 calories per bottle, and also uses Fruit Up Premium as its sweetener.
But this brand has an edgy look to it. The labels will be black with fluorescent color, which has a monochromatic appeal to it, says Paterson. Each flavor will be named: Pink (strawberry), Purple (grape), Red (cherry), Yellow (tropical), Green (lime), White (lemonade) and Orange (orange) to correspond with consumer buying habits where someone will literally say, “I want the purple one” or “I want the pink one.”
The company plans to market the brand through events like the X Games and Video Action Sports, a distributor of extreme sports or action sports videos, which is owned by Big Earth Brands’ chairman.
“When we started this company, we were a small group of guys that went to a little bit rougher part of town and bought ourselves a scale that could measure small quantities of powder and we started measuring vitamins to see if we could get them to blend in water,” says Paterson. “We realized very quickly that we were in over our heads.”
So the company turned to flavor formula developers and challenged them to create something that no one had done before. As the company’s saying goes: “If you think all vitamin waters are created equal, you are missing some Vital information.”
VITAL STATS
BIG EARTH BRANDS LTD.
PRESIDENT: Paul Paterson
HEADQUARTERS: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
’07 SALES: nearly US$700,000
EMPLOYEES: 12
GOALS: To continue to hold ourselves to a higher standard and be true innovators in the functional beverage category.
From Beverage World June 15, 2008
AI
