• 💰 BTomorrow Announces Fund II
• ⚠️ California Declares Bird Flu Emergency
• 👽 Millie Bobby Brown Aligns with Cha Cha
• ♻️ U.S. Plastics Pact Impact Report
• 💔 Kroger/Albertsons Break Up, Hershey Says ‘No, Thanks’ To Mondelēz Proposal

Moderate drinking is better than not drinking for certain health issues, according to the first of two major reports set to inform the 2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans’ alcohol consumption. Headlines have already proclaimed the study a win for the bev-alc industry, but that doesn't mean everyone (specifically women) should be toasting to the news. 

To be clear, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM)’s 230-page report doesn’t offer recommendations. Rather it combed through science from the past five to 15 years for evidence connecting moderate drinking and cancer, cardiovascular disease, neurocognition, weight and death due to any cause (all-cause mortality). 

• It also graded the quality of the evidence it compiled, specifying that conclusions were of lower or higher certainty based on insufficient or inconsistent evidence.

So what did the report find? Heavy drinking is, for sure, bad. “However, the association of moderate alcohol consumption with all-cause mortality is less clear,” the report reads. 

• An analysis of eight studies found that moderate drinkers (i.e. those consuming zero to two drinks, or 14 grams of alcohol, daily) had a 16% lower risk of all-cause mortality than non-drinkers. 
• Moderate drinking was associated with a lower risk of heart attack, stroke (low-certainty) and cardiovascular disease mortality (moderate certainty) as compared to never drinking. 
• Consuming a moderate amount of alcohol was associated with a higher risk of breast cancer as compared to never drinking (moderate certainty). 
• No conclusion on the associations between moderate drinking and risk of certain other cancers, but moderate drinkers who drank more alcohol have a higher risk of colorectal cancer (low certainty) when compared to moderate drinkers who consumed less alcohol. (This is a contrast from the World Heath Org’s latest statement).

With the committee’s reviews limited by a “consistent set of research gaps,” the report certainly doesn’t offer drinkers a crystal-clear picture. It should also be noted that the NASEM committee has been criticized for including researchers with financial ties to the bev-alc industry. 

Insiders can get all of the insight and essential takeaways in the full story on BevNET.

BTomorrow Ventures has launched its second fund, dedicating £200 million (around $250 million) to global investments in consumer brands, tech and “future sciences.”

• BTomorrow’s initial £150 million fund in 2020 led to investments in functional beverage brand Moment (winner of BevNET’s New Beverage Showdown 19 in 2020), TRU Drinks, HOP WTR, and caffeinated chocolate maker AWAKE, among other investments. 
• The firm is focused on early-stage businesses “that support the development of innovative, reduced-risk new category products,” the firm said in the announcement.

List your company in BevNET’s 2025 Supplier & Services Guide—an essential resource for thousands of food, beverage, and craft beer brands. Published in the Jan/Feb issue of BevNET Magazine and promoted digitally, your listing will reach 30,000+ industry professionals via BevNET, Nosh, Brewbound, and our newsletters.

Early bird pricing ends today, Dec. 19. Final deadline: Jan. 9. Learn more. 

California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency yesterday in response to a rise in H5N1 (avian flu) cases in the state’s dairy cows. The virus has spread among dairy cattle in 16 states since it was first detected in Texas and Kansas herds back in March. 

⏪ California identified its first infected herd in August and has found the virus in 645 dairies to date – including 311 cases in the past 30 days. Additionally, The Golden State recalled raw milk products from two companies earlier this month after H5N1 was detected in samples. 

🚨 The emergency order gives state and local agencies flexibility on staffing, contracting, and other rules to support the state’s evolving response which is set to include public updates, multilingual outreach to dairy and poultry workers and online and printed resources for the public. 

🗣️ What they said: “Building on California’s testing and monitoring system – the largest in the nation – we are committed to further protecting public health, supporting our agriculture industry, and ensuring that Californians have access to accurate, up-to-date information. While the risk to the public remains low, we will continue to take all necessary steps to prevent the spread of this virus.” - Gov. Gavin Newsom

Cha Cha Matcha and Millie Bobby Brown want consumers to drink their way to healthier skin with the latest brand/celeb collab beverage – the Glow Flo Latte.

🪻 Developed by Cha Cha and the Stranger Things star’s beauty and fashion brand Florence by Mills, the Glow Flo latte is an on-premise concoction containing lavender flavor, ube cold foam, hyaluronic acid for hydration and various peptides to support skin health. 

☕ This appears to be an LTO solely at Cha Cha Matcha’s retail shops in New York and L.A. While the brand previously sold RTD cans of its matcha lattes, it now only offers powdered matcha packs on its website.

🌟 Skincare supporting beverages continue to chug along and move beyond collagen brands like Vital Proteins. We’ve begun to see some recent skin drinks innovation (uh, we’ll rephrase that later) with other vegan-friendly recipes, like Remedy Organics’ Super Ube Glow, for one example. Florence by Mills makes vegan beauty products meaning the collagen-free concoction remains on-brand.

The U.S. Plastics Pact – a consortium of businesses, nonprofit organizations, government agencies and research institutions – released its 2023-2024 Impact Report with updates on its progress toward creating a circular economy for plastic packaging since its 2022 findings. Here are the highlights:

• Increased the use of post-consumer recycled content (PCR) in plastic packaging from 9.4% to 11%.
• A nominal rise in reusable, recyclable or compostable plastic packaging from 47.7% to 50%.

Though the Plastics Pact still has a long way to go in addressing the environmental impact of plastic packaging the report did highlight a success from Kraft Heinz, which transitioned its Crystal Light packaging from plastic to recyclable paperboard, eliminating 3 million pounds of plastic annually and advanced toward a 20% reduction in virgin plastic use by 2030.

The CPG Week team has returned from Nosh Live and BevNET Live to dive into the latest M&A activity. The podcasters sift through the important questions facing grocery retail and packaged food consolidation after the Kroger/Albertsons merger fell apart, dive into why Mondelēz made an attempt to acquire Hershey again and what the future holds for frozen potato product maker Lamb Weston. The CPG Weekers also shared their takes and highlights from BevNET Live last week.

Click here to listen to this week’s episode.

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