THE FOUNDING OF CULTURE-FOCUSED BEVERAGES.
We’ve all had flavored sparkling water at some point in our lives. Many of us cannot live without it – “flat” water is just so boring. With La Croix, Spindrift, Perrier, Polar, San Pellegrino, and others dominating the shelves, do we really need another one? We met Sandro Roco, a Queens-born Filipino American, in 2019 during a series of interviews we had with up-and-coming food & beverage brands. During our conversation with Sandro, it became clear that he wasn’t focused on the competition in the sparkling beverage space; instead, he was concerned with the preservative and sugar-laden Asian beverage brands sold around New York City. He had a very simple vision: make a product that celebrates authentic, high-quality Asian flavors from around the world but “Americanize” them and clean-up their ingredient panels for the modern US consumer. At this very moment, Sandro created one of the most highly awarded and regarded sparkling waters on the market, and he unknowingly invented a new movement towards culture-focused beverages.
The 1st Asian-inspired sparkling water, Sanzo celebrates high-quality Asian flavors using real fruit and no added sugars.
MERCENARY FUNDING FORCE™ – DIRECT INVESTMENT
Creating a beverage brand that represents the bridging of cultures, East and West, and launching it alone in New York City was no small task. Sandro had a small, semi-automatic canning partner in Brooklyn, and he began selling his beverages throughout the city – leveraging the subway system to self-distribute. On top of this, he partnered with us to help sell his beverages Direct to Consumers leveraging our SMS Text-to-Order platform and supply chain. We noticed first-hand that Sandro is smart, determined, and has the right hustle to be successful as an entrepreneur, and Sanzo was selling like crazy – we knew we just had to be a part of this journey and joined his cap table.
MERCENARY FOLLOWING FORCE™ – FOUNDER 911™, TALENT EVALUATION, AND TEAM RETENTION & DEVELOPMENT
Growing a brand is challenging for many reasons, but usually, the first thing we find a founder is lacking is a strong team. While we leaned in to help Sandro in any way that we could as augmented help, we knew his growth trajectory was moving so fast that he needed to build his own internal operations team. Sandro had access to some impressive talent in New York, but how could he be sure who was the best candidate overall for the present and future growth of the company? How could he afford someone with significant experience that commanded a large salary? When the conversation about equity comes up, how much should he give a new employee and under what vesting terms should he grant it? We helped Sanzo navigate through all of this and more from his first hire through a broader team.
MERCENARY FRICTION FORCE™
– FOOD SCIENCE+ AND MASTER FORMULATION
Making your products taste delicious is paramount. Making sure that the delicious products you create are scalable and have strong gross margins is essential. With a few years in the market selling only the initial three (3) core SKUs, Sanzo began developing new innovations to broaden their core line with a Yuzu flavor option and several partnership SKUs, including Disney / Marvel’s Shang Chi superhero film and Jeremy Lin’s documentary. With this new worldwide attention on the brand, we had to ensure that the formulas were optimized for scale and cost-effectiveness without sacrificing the flavor that fans of the brand crave.
MERCENARY FULFILLMENT FORCE™ – MANUFACTURING & PROCUREMENT, QUALITY & COMPLIANCY, AND CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT
On average, fast-scaling CPG brands change manufacturing partners four (4) times during their growth from pre-launch to exit – and this doesn’t include redundant copackers for shipment cost savings or risk mitigation. Startup brands generally don’t have stable processes or enough demand to garner the attention of a “Conventional Copacker” right from the outset, so they have to work through several “Cowboy Copackers” that offer speed and flexibility at the expense of quality, consistency, and tolling prices.
Like Sanzo, once a brand has dialed-in their formulas and demand planning, they are ready to transition to a conventional copacker which improves their overall quality, consistency, and costs. We assisted Sanzo through this journey to set them up with successful manufacturing for years to come. There will be many more chapters to this story, and we Mercenaries are excited to continue our part in it.