• 🥛 Oatly's Profitable Growth Plan
• ⭐ Reviews? We Got 'Em
• 📊 Remy: Rocked in China, Recovers in U.S.
• 🥃 Spirits Industry Updates
• 🍎 Nestlé Evolves Nutrition Reporting
• 🎨 No Time To (Food) Dye

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The outlook is indeed sunnier on the investment front, indicated by a series of details offered up by brand-focused investors and deal advisors at the recently completed Beverage Forum in California this week. If true, it’s a sea change for an industry that saw announced deals drop quarter-after-quarter over the past three years, with few exceptions.

Strategic M&A activity – the sales of Poppi, Ghost, and Alani Nu in recent months – “has brought a lot of capital into the marketplace,” said Ryan Lewendon, partner at CPG specialist law firm Giannuzzi Lewendon, during a dealmakers’ panel at the event.

Meanwhile, smaller investments are starting to move through the system as well. Lewendon said his firm had closed more deals in the $10 million to $50 million range in the first quarter of 2025 “than in all of 2023.”

Since the start of the year, BevNET has reported on investment in companies like Lucky Energy and Gorgie; yesterday sports nutrition brand Don’t Quit also announced a $15 million raise as part of its launch of a protein soda. Other soft drink companies, like Culture Pop, Nixie, and RYL Tea have also confirmed substantial raises.

And don’t forget Poppi competitor Olipop, which pulled in $50 million in February. 

Why deals have been down for several years:

• Brands valued growth over fiscal discipline, driving valuations and risk up for investors
• Investors had trouble finding institutional limited partners amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and economic turmoil

Companies have started to get religion and repent from growth-at-all-costs. Prominent investor Wayne Wu, general partner at consumer PE fund VMG, noted that in the last few months he had seen “more high-quality, well-built companies” than he had in a long time.

Still Of Concern: Stock market fluctuations, high interest rates, and economic uncertainty related to tariffs and trade. Investors say the year’s true test will be in the third and fourth quarter, when they are heavily shopping deals.

Insiders can access the full story for all of the insights.

Even within a “dynamic operating environment,” Oatly claims it is on track to deliver its first full year of profitable growth since going public, with CEO Jean-Christophe Flatin highlighting recent supply chain and overhead structure efficiencies in its Q1 earnings report. Here are some key numbers: 

• Gross profit margin climbed 449 basis points to 31.6%. 
• Gross profit up to $62.3 million, marking Oatly’s best quarter since its IPO. 
• Revenue dipped 0.8% year-over-year to $197.5 million, with North America contributing $59.9 million (down 10.6%) to that total.
• North America volume sales slipped 10.9%, due to sales reductions at its largest foodservice account and some SKU rationalization on frozen items.

💭 “The biggest takeaway is that we are making progress toward our north star of structural, consistent, profitable goals. We [made] a significant transformation over the past two years, and with the progress in Q1, our financial results came in largely as expected,” said Flatin. 

Check out the full earnings recap on BevNET.

This week at BevNET we rounded up Poppi’s new Alpine Blast, Recess’ new Orange Vanilla SKU and Lapo’s non-alcoholic Citrus Spritz.

Then, we chronicled our thoughts with each swig, highlighting aspects of the brand, liquid and product positioning that stood out and things the company could consider for next time. 

🆓 Check out this week’s review roundup on BevNET.

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Remy Cointreau is hurting from the trade wars. China’s provisional suspension of duty-free sales dragged on cognac performance and contributed to a drop in organic growth by 19% for the full-year 2024.

⤴️ Despite a 20% decline in the Americas, there have been encouraging signs of a “steep recovery” in Q4, with Cointreau, St Rémy, Mount Gay and The Botanist helping drive sales +16.1% in the Liqueurs & Spirits division.

⤵️ But the French conglomerate reported a nearly 33% drop in cognac sales, thanks in part to  provisional 38.1% tariff on cognac imports in China enacted last October.

• If affirmed (likely by July), the impact on FY 2024-25 will be “marginal” but will trigger an action plan to “mitigate the effects” in FY 2025-26.
• There’s also the looming specter of President Trump’s 20% tariffs on all imports from the European Union, which (remember?) are only under 90-day suspension, at least for the moment.

Read the full earnings report.

Two Scottish spirits makers announced big changes this week in an effort to create more efficiencies in production and distribution. Let’s look at the pour…

🤝 Scotch whisky (mind your “e”) makers MacDuff International and InchDairnie Distillery have merged under the new name InchDairnie Whisky Limited. MacDuff produces the Islay Mist and Lauder’s brands and has handled sales and distribution for InchDairnie’s RyeLaw variety.

😔 On the more unfortunate side, Isle of Harris Distillery, which makes an eponymous gin and The Hearach single-malt whiskey, announced it would be restructuring to “safeguard the future.” The distillery plans to lay off about 45 employees of its roughly 50 person team as it faces “challenging headwinds.”

Category Catch Up: Westward Whiskey Files For Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

Today’s the last day to be included in BevNET’s 2025 Alcohol & Alternatives Guide.

The guide features brands, suppliers, and service providers across spirits, RTDs, beer, wine, cannabis drinks, kava, non-alc options, mixers, and more. It will appear in the May/June issue of BevNET Magazine, on BevNET.com, and in our daily newsletter.

If you’re looking to build awareness and connect with beverage industry professionals, submit your listing by the end of the day. Submit your listing. 

Nestlé is evolving its reporting on the nutritional value of its products to make it easier for investors to compare companies and portfolios across the food industry, according to a LinkedIn post by CEO Laurent Freixe. 

The Nesquik and Hot Pockets maker aims to:

• Align its data with the scope of the Access to Nutrition initiative 
• Include a sales weighted average measure both for relevant categories and for the total portfolio. 
• Continue to use the government-approved Health Star Rating system as the basis of its nutrition profile reporting. 

💬 “We hope other companies in the food industry will consider following our lead,” Freixe said.

On this episode of the CPG Week podcast, the team parses through the recent FDA/HHS directive to remove synthetic dyes from food and beverage products. 

The podcasters discuss why the timeline for this voluntary ban might be too aggressive for many large companies to meet, how it further challenges already stressed supply chains and, the most pressing question: What will happen to Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and Trix cereal if forced to pivot to more natural colorings?

Tune into the episode here. Also available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Like what you are listening to? Please don’t hesitate to rate our show and leave a review on your podcast platform of choice.