7/7: Big Electrolyte Summer
This week we share 5 new brands as well as trends spotted this week. Read founder stories, interviews, and expert tips on how to grow your brand.
Big Electrolyte Summer
Hi, and welcome back to CPGD: your weekly guide to emerging brands and industry trends! It’s Zoya here, Head of Growth.
Hope you had a great long weekend! Not long ago, electrolyte products were largely associated with endurance athletes. Today, they’ve become an everyday wellness staple packed in gym bags, mixed into morning water, taken before flights, and on office desks. The shift is reflected in our own community: there are now 22 hydration and electrolyte brands in the CPGD directory, spanning everything from powders and tablets to functional beverages and wellness-first formulations.
Browse the Electrolyte Brands on our Radar!
Here’s the highlight reel from this week’s newsletter:
🎯 Nutrabolt, the company behind C4 Energy, Bloom Sparkling Energy, XTEND, and Cellucor, confidentially files for IPO
🐿️ French Squirrel collabed with SunLife Organics launching chocolate-covered Medjool dates filled with pistachio butter and organic tahini
💬 A Founder Q&A with Sara Brooks, Founder of Plainspeak
5 Brands Added This Week:
Every week, we add five new brands to the directory. Here are the brands we’ve been loving...
Barriere: Wearable vitamin and adaptogen patches for convenient daily wellness.
Kind Patches: Natural wellness patches for stress, sleep, energy, and focus.
Pouch: Ready to drink wellness beverages for hydration and daily health.
Muracha: Premium Japanese matcha brand for a mindful tea experience.
Wasted: Upcycled pasta made from rescued bread to reduce food waste.
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News Last Week 🗞️
💰 Funding & Acquisitions – raises, venture news, and M&A
Nutrabolt, the company behind C4 Energy, Bloom Sparkling Energy, XTEND, and Cellucor, confidentially files for IPO.
InvestEco Capital, an investor in brands including LesserEvil Snacks, Mid-Day Squares, Little Sesame, and Algae Cooking Club, closes Fund IV with $106M CAD in commitments.
🚀 Launches & New Products – new brands, product drops, and line extensions
Create Wellness launched Sour Grape, its seventh Creatine Gummy flavor inspired by ‘90s grape soda and sour straws, available DTC and on Amazon starting July 7.
French Squirrel partnered with SunLife Organics to launch chocolate-covered Medjool dates filled with pistachio butter and organic tahini.
Barebells introduced its new Cookie Milk Drink, packing 24g of protein and just 2g of sugar.
Perfect Bar expanded into oat-based snacks with the launch of Oaties in Oatmeal Cookie Dough and Brownie Batter.
🛒 Retail & Distribution – brands entering retailers, door count expansions, and partnerships
Ice Cream for Bears launched Lemon Blue Bear, its newest honey-sweetened flavor, now available at Sprouts.
Bakeful expanded its Target assortment with the launch of Target-exclusive Brownieful Mini Brownies, bringing more clean-label, lunchbox-friendly options to families nationwide.
Brand Experience Corner with Promobile
ProMobile is an agency that’s Built Different. It’s what you get when you put experiential marketing, CPG field marketing, and hospitality in a blender, then crank it up to ten. The category-defying team brings brands and consumers together through unforgettable live experiences, combining bold creative thinking with world-class logistics and flawless execution.
Over the years, ProMobile has had the privilege of partnering with some of the world’s most recognizable brands, including Chobani, Hellmann’s, Dove, Yerba Madre, Talenti, Sweetgreen, Popsicle, TRUFF, La Colombe, Momofuku, Newman’s Own, and PHX. Below is a look at a few experiences that showcase what being Built Different looks like in action.
Liquid I.V. | Hydratruck Tour
Liquid I.V. challenged ProMobile to create a bold, modular experience capable of hydrating one million Americans, then take it on the road. The result was a fleet of custom Hydratrucks that transformed everyday sampling into a high-impact, mobile brand experience built to meet consumers wherever summer took them.
Each vehicle featured custom iconography, dynamic lighting, and a signature hexagon structure that made the fleet instantly recognizable. Working alongside HOPE Hydration, ProMobile also developed a first-of-its-kind onboard hydration system, allowing the trucks to operate as fully self-contained hydration stations. Fans could even request Sip Stops in their own communities, giving consumers a voice in where the tour traveled next. Over three years, the program has distributed more than 8 million samples, visited 40+ cities, and continues to serve as an always-on extension of the Liquid I.V. brand.
Founder Q&A with Sara Brooks of Plainspeak
This week, we’re featuring Plainspeak, a new women’s wellness brand cutting through the noise with evidence-backed products and refreshingly honest messaging. Founded by the team behind Goldilocks, Plainspeak is on a mission to help women navigate health and longevity with clarity not fear.
Tell us a little about Plainspeak and what you’re building.
We’re the founders of Plainspeak, a brand for grown women built on a radical idea: talk to women like adults and give them products that work, backed by real science.
Our first product, Strength Water™, combines 15g protein, 5g creatine, 5g collagen, calcium, and vitamin D into one simple daily ritual for women 35+ who are tired of sorting through wellness noise.
What inspired you to start Plainspeak?
We’re three best friends and business partners who run Goldilocks, a brand consultancy. We watched the wellness industry go from largely ignoring women to aggressively monetizing their anxiety. At the same time, we felt stronger, wiser, and more confident than ever yet every message suggested we should be fixing ourselves. We got tired of it and decided to build the brand we wished existed.
What’s one thing most people misunderstand about women’s wellness today?
The wellness industry has convinced women they always need another miracle ingredient or complicated protocol. What women actually need isn’t more. They need to know what matters, what doesn’t, and what’s actually backed by evidence with a little humor, too.
What’s something building Plainspeak has taught you?
The three of us have helped build more than 200 CPG brands, which gave us a dangerous amount of confidence heading into this. Nothing has increased our respect for founders more than becoming founders ourselves.
What’s something you’re obsessed with right now?
The gap between what women actually want and what the wellness industry keeps trying to sell them. Plainspeak was born in our group chats with friends asking thoughtful questions about strength, hormones, and longevity then immediately wondering whether they should be eating beef organs because of something they saw online. That disconnect is exactly why Plainspeak exists.
What are you most excited about right now?
We’re building far more than a supplement company. Our goal is to become the most trusted voice in women’s wellness by changing the tone of the conversation itself.
Follow Plainspeak along: Linkedin | Instagram: @weareplainspeak
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The wellness patch boom going crazy