Amanda Del Buono

Chicago-based Mintel’s Global New Products Database shows that between January 2015 and January 2016, 5,226 new beverages were launched in North America.

When Albert Einstein died in 1955, Thomas Harvey, a pathologist at the hospital where the famous inventor died, was so curious about the brilliance of Einstein’s brain that he stole it for his own studies.

Health and wellness remains an overarching driving factor in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) market today. As such, consumers have increasingly grown cautious of the products that they put in their bodies, with a growing number avoiding sugar-sweetened beverages. But one brand is tackling this issue by trying to reinvent the juice category.

Building a successful brand isn’t San Diego-based Suja Life LLC’s only mission. For those in the company, it’s about more than the product. “From a company standpoint, we want to make a difference in the lives of our consumers,” Suja’s Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder Jeff Church says.

Thirty-eight percent of consumers prefer aluminum cans when tailgating versus 26 percent who prefer plastic bottles. Thirty-six percent of consumers prefer cans at barbecues or picnics, compared with 30 percent who prefer plastic bottles.

Even though consumers always will have to shop for groceries, the channels in which they visit continually change, and supermarkets now are feeling the pressures of these changes.

By May 2013, Mike Steiner and Jake Paulson had grown weary of the years they had spent on the road touring as front-of-house audio engineers in the rock music industry, so they switched channels and founded a cold-brew coffee company they dubbed Anchorhead Coffee.