• ⚡Nutrabolt Invests In TikTok-Powered Wellness Brand Bloom Nutrition
• 🗣️ Nutpods CEO Talks Brand Sale, Life as a “Bigger Player”

Nutrabolt, the nutrition supplement maker behind Cellucor and C4, has taken a 20% ownership stake in health supplement maker Bloom Nutrition, part of a larger $90 million financing that sees Deep Eddy Vodka founder Clayton Christopher and consumer investment firm Amberstone also coming onboard. 

After establishing initial traction with athletes and fitness enthusiasts, Nutrabolt has gradually branched out into mainstream retail and introduced new lines, like the cognition-boosting C4 Smart Energy. 

Aligning with Bloom gives Nutrabolt a foothold with female consumers in the broader health and wellness space; along with its top-selling Greens powder (itself championed by TikTok influencers), the company offers pre-workout, protein powders, and collagen creamers both online and, as of last year, at retailers like Target, Walmart and GNC. The company collaborated with Vita Coco on a promotion for its Greens & Superfoods stick packs earlier this year. 

According to a press release, the investment will “provide strategic growth capital to fuel and accelerate many key areas of Bloom's business – namely demand-generation activities, product innovation, and expanding internal capabilities to support the growing business.”

"When we started this company, we could've never imagined building such a huge community, and inspiring so many to begin their wellness journeys. Our goal at Bloom has always been to help everyone 'bloom' into their best selves through nutritious and delicious supplements. It's an incredible honor to have Nutrabolt join us in extending our mission further," said Mari Llewellyn, who co-founded Bloom with Greg LaVecchia in 2019. Both will remain on the company’s board. 

Commenting on the investment, Nutrabolt's Chairman and CEO Doss Cunningham praised the duo as “outstanding entrepreneurial founders” who have built a strong business, while adding ”there is still tremendous whitespace to pursue in the form of new product platforms and distribution opportunities."

Christopher, a CPG veteran and an existing investor in Nutrabolt, will join the company’s board of directors, alongside Cunningham. Amberstone – whose portfolio includes investments in CPG brands like Honey Mama’s, Partake Brewing and June Shine – also participated in the funding round.

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Energy giant Monster has a long pipeline of innovation in store for 2024, the company unveiled during its annual Investor Meeting in New York yesterday.

🌩️ The company continues to focus on its Reign and Reign Storm brands, with a new Sour Gummy Worm flavor coming to the former while four new additions will be added to the latter. Co-CEO Rodney Sacks suggested the company views the two brands as separate entities playing to different consumers and will be marketed as such.

💣 Along with getting a visual refresh, Bang’s unwieldy portfolio has been trimmed to 12 top SKUs. While co-CEO Hilton Schlosberg wouldn’t promise a return to Bang’s past glory, he said the company is confident it can reignite the brand’s sagging sales and bring lapsed consumers back into the fold.

🫖 In alcohol, Nasty Beast Hard Tea will be hitting shelves throughout January and February. The company plans to merchandise the line alongside its malt offering The Beast Unleashed, moving the latter’s single serve variety into 24 oz. cans with aims to place both lines alongside each other in coolers to present a larger facing.

Read the full recap of the call on BevNET.

Nutpods’ time as an independent brand may be coming to an end, but founder and CEO Madeline Haydon says she still has more chapters to write for the plant-based coffee creamer maker following its acquisition yesterday by Kroger-backed investment group MPearlRock. Amidst a flurry of press attention surrounding the news, Brad Avery caught up with the entrepreneur yesterday afternoon: 

🏢 Haydon confirmed she will stay with the business as CEO and a board director for the “foreseeable future,” boosted by the confidence of witnessing Nutpods become competitive with leading non-dairy creamer brands like So Delicious and International Delight: “We've already proven that we can go head-to-head with publicly held companies and brands, said the founder.

📊 Per Haydon, that gave the grocery giant an intimate view of Nutpods’ velocities and sales metrics prior to the acquisition – a model that could illuminate MPearlRock’s larger strategy. In its formal announcement last week, the asset management group, headed by former Keurig CEO Brian Kelley, said it will seek to leverage retail data science and insights from Kroger’s in-house analytics team, 84.51° 

Those numbers (we’d love to see, by the way) may suggest which emerging categories or trends the firm looks to put its money on next.  

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