Sports Ingredients: Hot to Market

Aside from scientific ingredients that are still being innovated, there’s always room for a simpler product-if marketed correctly.

Coconut water has been gaining ground in each year of its infancy on the sports beverage market. Marketed as a natural, sugar-free alternative to typical sports performance drinks, coconut water companies promise key electrolytes and high amounts of potassium to ward off muscle cramps.

Today’s major players in this burgeoning market are Vita Coco (New York City), Zico (Hermosa Beach, CA), and O.N.E. (Los Angeles). Each company has been busy beefing up its own market. Between Vita Coco’s celebrity endorsements, Zico’s minority investor (Coke), and O.N.E.’s owner (Pepsi) recently purchasing Brazil’s largest coconut water company, Amacoco (São Paulo), the coconut water market appears staged for further growth. It is already projected at $60 million in annual sales, nationwide.

Early success of coconut waters is helping usher in other coconut delivery systems, too. Coco Energy, by Ajmera Innovations (Anaheim, CA), is a coconut water powder now available at select Whole Foods (Austin, TX) stores. Coco Energy is a quick-to-dissolve powder that pledges to offer 1700 mg of potassium in each serving. The company says it is the world’s only truly natural coconut water powder mix.