3/24: The New Logo is...

Mar 24, 2026

The New Logo is...

The ingredient panel?

Hi, and welcome back to CPGD: your weekly guide to emerging brands and industry trends. It’s Head of Growth & Content, Zoya, here!

This brand at Happier Grocer in particular stuck out to us -- these superfood protein puffs made the bold choice of moving their ingredient panel to the front of pack.

Whatever, a snack brand spotted at Happier Grocer, takes this literally: the nutrition label is the packaging. No lifestyle imagery, no “made with real” claim in a sunburst - just the raw information.

“Clean” has been the operative word in better-for-you food for years, but perhaps the more interesting move now is to skip the claim entirely and just show the work. Less branding theater, more proof points. Or, just one proof point.

Make sure to scroll down for our full taste test in the yogurt department and an awesome Q&A with Holiday Vodka.

Also... we are hosting a morning refresh at Othership on Tuesday, March 31st, at 8 am in NYC. Sign up here if you are interested in attending (for founders and decision makers @ CPG brands)!

5 Brands Added This Week:

Every week we add five new brands to the directory. Here are the brands we’ve been loving...

Sabe Sauce: Clean, convenient single serve sauces for everyday flavor.
Tofu Go: Plant based tofu snacks made for healthy, protein rich snacking.
Rerise Health: Health supplements for energy, focus, and wellness.
Holiday Vodka: Premium vodka for smooth, high quality cocktails.
Arame: Inspired by ancient Mesopotamian oral care.
Tips and tools

71% of consumers purchase within days of seeing creator content...

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Book a Call

Community Resources

From Listen Ventures: Understanding your customer cohorts is one of the most important things a consumer brand can do—and one of the hardest to do well.

Listen has built its own cohort software, Listen Cohorts, to underwrite investments, and they’re offering it to founders for free. Why? If it can help founders build better relationships with their customers... why not?

Upload your data, and the tool illustrates customer retention, how LTV builds over time, and where your best customers actually come from. It also has an AI analysis layer that explains your metrics in plain English - answering the same questions an investor would ask. After all, founders are the biggest investors in their brands! Excel is limiting, and SaaS tools cost thousands annually. This is instant and free!

For more on Listen Cohorts, check out https://cohorts.listen.codes/!

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For Investors:

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News Last Week 🗞️

💰 Funding & Acquisitions – raises, venture news, and M&A

Good Girl Snacks closed a $3M seed round co-led by Strand Equity and RiverPark Ventures with participation from Nucleus Ventures, Collaborative Fund

🚀 Launches & New Products – new brands, product drops, and line extensions

Yes Way Rosé will debut its first non-alcoholic still rosé
Little Spoon announced its entry into the infant formula category with the launch of its Organic Grass-Fed Whole Milk Infant Formula
Esprizio, a new-to-market non-alc espresso spritz just launched, founded by the former creative director of Oilpop & GT’s
Freaks of Nature just launched Skin Support Electrolyte, a daily hydration mix that brings the brand into ingestible skincare

🛒 Retail & Distribution – brands entering retailers, door count expansions, and partnerships

Poppi is now on Starbucks shelves
Grüns is now available nationwide at Costco

Have breaking news you want us to share? Send us a note at team@cpgd.xyz or reply to this email.

CPGD, Reviewed 🤳

We tried Painterland Sisters and Sourmilk side by side at Happier Grocer, and they each feel like they’re building very different versions of what “modern yogurt” can be.

Painterland Sisters leans into simplicity and provenance. You can taste the quality immediately; it’s rich, creamy, and feels like something you’d keep stocked as a staple. Clean ingredients, strong sourcing story, and a texture that makes it easy to come back to daily.

Sourmilk goes in the opposite direction in the best way possible. More playful, against-the-grain branding, and very clearly built for a newer consumer. The flavors stand out right away, slightly tangy, a little unexpected, and designed to feel like a treat without fully crossing into dessert.

Next up: nut butters. Pistachio, almond, peanut. Really... anything. If you’re a brand in the category and want to be included, we’d love to try you. Shoot us a message!

Founder Q&A with Olivia of Holiday Vodka 🍸

This week, I am so excited to sit down and talk with Olivia Peniston of Holiday Vodka. I’ve been obsessed with Holiday’s branding since I first came across it. Olivia joined as COO, and her vision for what a spirits brand can be is truly unlike anything in the category at the moment.

What is Holiday Vodka? How did you start your journey?

I’m Olivia Peniston, COO of Holiday Vodka. I’m a New Yorker with a background in hospitality M&A and real estate private equity, and I went to Stanford GSB to explore building consumer brands.

Holiday is a clean, celebratory vodka for the modern consumer. It’s made in Italy with just two ingredients: water from the Italian Alps and soft Italian wheat, distilled at a fourth-generation family-owned distillery in Piedmont. It’s for people who are thoughtful about what they consume but still want to enjoy drinking.

What I love about Holiday is that it delivers across the board. It’s incredibly smooth, clean-label, and more accessible than many legacy brands. It’s built for people who care about quality and connection, not just the category standard.

We feel like we’re seeing Holiday everywhere. What would you attribute that to?

From day one, we focused on building within the communities where our earliest champions would emerge. That meant bartenders, tastemakers, and founders shaping culture in New York.

We prioritized getting onto cocktail menus, thoughtful gifting, and showing up through brand activations in places that felt aligned. At the same time, we’ve been active participants in those communities by supporting businesses and people we genuinely believe in.

That combination of intentional placement and real community involvement created a ripple effect. It made Holiday feel everywhere within the right circles, even early on.

What has been one surprising lesson or challenge you’ve encountered while building the brand?

Customers will tell you where the opportunity is if you listen closely.

We launched with a $0 marketing budget and focused on influencer gifting, which generated over 15 million impressions. What surprised us was how many people wanted to buy the influencer boxes themselves.

We leaned into that demand and turned it into a broader gifting opportunity. That included everything from holiday gifting to a real estate agent planning to order nearly 200 of our Summer 2026 boxes.

It was a reminder that the best growth paths often come directly from your customers.

How do you hope customers feel when they interact with your product?

I want people to feel joy, but also like they’re stepping into a world they want to be part of.

Holiday is meant to live in the moments that bring people together. Beach happy hours, après-ski, weekend trips. Choosing it should feel like a reflection of their taste, values, and how they want to experience life.

What’s next for the brand? Any upcoming launches or milestones you’re excited about?

We recently launched in California and are planning a West Coast launch event. We’re also gearing up for a big summer in the Hamptons, working on a collaboration with a New York fitness studio, and continuing to invest in brand activations.

We’re about to begin our second production run in Italy, which is especially exciting because it allows us to bring customers closer to our supply chain and the people behind the product.

What’s something you’re currently obsessed with as a brand builder right now?

I draw a lot of inspiration from outside the spirits category. Brands like Rhode, Jacquemus, and Loewe have built worlds, not just products.

That’s always been the ambition with Holiday. Every touchpoint should feel intentional and connected, from the bottle to the events to the Instagram.

The product brings people in, but the world is what creates emotional connection and keeps them coming back.

Thank you, Olivia! :)