The prebiotic soda wars and why everything comes back to brand
Soda is all about good feelings. Whether loaded with sugar, caffeine, and/or artificial sweeteners, the bubbly tonic is meant to be fun. And perhaps no brand is currently leaning into that better than Poppi. On the company’s about page, co-founder and Chief Brand Office Allison Ellsworth is nearly Barbie-esque in her pink blazer, long blond locks, and corresponding long cheetah print nails. In this official photo, she perfectly embodies the brand’s goal of creating “the future of soda.”
What makes this ultra-pop focus even more interesting is that it’s actually a rebrand of Ellsworth’s original invention: a similarly fizzy beverage marketed as a kombucha-adjacent vinegar infused drink. Packaged in slim glass bottles with floral labels, the old brand was sedately “healthy” looking.
It wasn’t until Poppi fully embraced being a soda brand, and all the trappings of it, in 2020, that business took off.
And it has truly taken off. Poppi is now large enough to be causing controversy with its marketing ploys, like its Super Bowl gambit of delivering full sized Poppi vending machines to a few influencers’ garages. It hit a sour note with some customers, and their competitor Olipop swooped in to capitalize.
Olipop is actually the OG of canned probiotic soda, getting its start in 2018. Now, the brand features a flavor lineup clearly informed by top-sellers from the Coca-Cola and Pepsi lineup. But Olipop hasn’t strayed completely from its better-for-you roots. Four doctors are listed on its about page under the heading “Research Partners.”
From the first moments of Olipop, and later, Poppi’s success, came competitors.
The core innovation of both Olipop and Poppi is that they are prebiotic, which means they contain fiber which healthy gut microbes are known to consume. So, the theory goes, you are supporting your gut microbiome with every sip.
Culture Pop Soda came along in 2020 with a slightly different tact: probiotic instead of prebiotic benefits, meaning, Culture Pop puts live cultures right into the soda. Any avid consumer of probiotic supplements will tell you these beneficial microbes are fragile beings, and storage conditions must be just right for them to stay alive and thrive. How many live cultures are you actually getting when you crack open a can of Culture Pop may vary, but at least in the canning factory they’re alive and well.
Not to be outdone by the others, leading kombucha brand Health Ade introduced SunSip in early 2024. Rather than capitalizing on probiotics like they do with their kombuchas, SunSip pivoted into the prebiotic and vitamin-infused space. CBD sparkling water brand Daytrip came out with their own prebiotic soda. And if prebiotic isn’t enough for you, there’s postbiotic soda from No Cap! which launched in 2024.
It took half a decade, but at last Coca-Cola is done letting the independent upstarts own the prebiotic beverage market. Simply Pop is now available in some markets. Yes, that’s Simply as in the Simply Orange Juice line that’s been around for years. Simply Pop cans are narrower than traditional twelve ounce cans, and the flavor lineup is more juice-inspired than soda inspired.
But of course Coca-Cola has instant, and massive, advantages over its older prebiotic competitors. It has the distribution network and scale means that more people will likely try Simply Pop within its first year than did all the upstarts in their first year combined.
But whether consumers leave Olipop and Poppi for Coca-Cola is yet to be seen. First, the product has to taste amazing. Second, it has to be widely available. Coca-Cola has to believe in it enough to give it wide enough distribution. Those two balls are in the corporate HQ’s court. But the other wild card is whether consumers are loyal to a favorite brand already, and if so, if Simply will be good enough (or cheap enough) to make them switch.
If someone is sold on the idea of drinking something sweet with the promise of better gut health, they’ll pick up any brand. But if someone lives for Olipop’s Ridge Rush, then the big CC is out of luck. And that brand loyalty is the only factor in the indie brand’s court.
This is why it’s never enough to make a product, no matter how innovative. You must build a strong brand to support it. And yes, that includes not only values and culture, but also strong packaging, a brand voice, and great copy. It feels like a lot of work up front, but when the CPG giants of the world see your success and want to imitate it, you’ll be glad you invested in creating a brand fans can stick with.
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Anna Bradshaw Content Co. is a copywriting and content marketing agency offering website copywriting services for CPG companies that want to build enduring brands.