US probiotic drinks business Culture Pop Soda has raised $15m in equity funding, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing.
Listed as Gutsy, Inc, the Massachusetts-based soda maker sold $15.15m equity in the funding round of the $27.1m it offered to the market, the filing, made on 11 April, showed.
The fresh capital comes from investors including US fund Enlightened Hospitality Investments (EHI).
Just Drinks has approached Culture Pop for comment.
Culture Pop last raised equity funds in early 2024, when it brought in $21m. It had previously raised $3.5m and $215,000 in equity sales in 2021 and 202. It also raised $1.1m in a debt sale in 2020.
The probiotic beverage is sold in the US and was founded by CEO Tom First in 2020.
Speaking to Just Drinks in 2023, First said innovation had been lacking in the carbonated soft drinks market. “There have been disruptors in iced tea and a lot of still drinks – and coconut water is almost like a replacement for sports drinks – but carbonated soft drinks have been traditionally dominated by the incumbents, the legacy brands,” he said.
“There are a few [functional soda] brands and we’re certainly one of them, along with the likes of Poppi and Olipop, that have entered this market and got a lot of distribution,” First added.
So-called gut-friendly sodas have caught the attention of major drinks groups. In March, PepsiCo struck a deal to buy Texas-based brand Poppi, formerly known as Mother Beverage, for $1.95bn.
In February, Olipop, a local competitor of Poppi, was valued at $1.85bn after raising $50m in a Series C funding round, led by JP Morgan Private Capital’s Growth Equity Partners.
Just before the PepsiCo deal, Poppi settled a lawsuit in the US filed by consumers who claimed they were misled by the company and questioned the brand’s gut-health attributes.
Just Drinks parent company GlobalData put the value of the global probiotic drinks market at $9.6bn in 2023, down from $10bn in 2022. Though data for 2024 is incomplete, the year's value will be close to figures for 2023.
