Michael Kirban, co-founder of Vita Coco, discusses the brand's initial category positioning and inspiration from Brazilian consumer habits.
Disclosure
Kirban: Vita Coco sabotaged Zico by buying and trashing products
“A lot of that, you know, I mean, literally, like, buying their product out of stores, putting it in trash cans, taking their point of sale material down, hiding it in back rooms, stupid stuff.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Kirban: Zico parked a sampling truck outside Vita Coco's office
“They would literally, just to piss us off, they would set up their sampling truck outside of our office every other day and sample people. So everybody around our office would be walking around with Zico.”
Assertion Partly supported
Kirban: Zico switched to concentrate after Coca-Cola invested
“As soon as Coke invested in that business,
They moved to a concentrate model. So they were no longer a hundred percent pure premium coconut water, not from concentrate.”
Assertion Supported
Kirban: Vita Coco partnered with ex-employees of Zico's distributor
“The beauty about them is they were a bunch of guys that had left the distributor where Zico was sold. So not only were they a much smaller distributor, but they also had it out for that distributor and for Zico.”
Assertion Supported
Madonna and a celebrity cohort funded an entire Vita Coco investment round
“And he started making some phone calls and he, you know, called Timmy Moore and he called Matthew McConaughey, called Anthony Kiedis, a bunch of People and, you know, said, I'll take, we'll take, we'll, me and my friends, we'll take the whole round. Madonna to…”
Insight
Kirban: Celebrity equity investors promote brands more effectively than paid endorsers
“So now we're not paying somebody to endorse our brand. They've, in theory, paid us, right? They've invested. Now they have ownership. And they're now more motivated than if they were getting paid, you know, a couple hundred grand or whatever it is to go do som…”