Teavana has added trio of functional teas via collaboration between brand owner Starbucks and production/distribution partner Anheuser-Busch. Dubbed Wellness Craft Iced Teas, the entries trickling out to Whole Foods and other retailers now delve into range of botanical ingredients along with adaptogens like ginger and turmeric to offer recipes dubbed Defense, Balance and Refresh. They're line-priced with other dozen Teavana RTD entries at $2.39 per 12-oz glass bottle.

It's been conundrum in bevs: fruit juice is packed with nutrients but at tradeoff of high level of sugar that consumers are less willing to ingest these days. That's created cottage industry of foodtech startups seeking to capture the former with the least amount of the latter. One of these, Israel's Better Juice Ltd, now says it's gotten its patent-pending tech to point of being ready to scale in coming year, with several unidentified juicecos enlisted as development partners.

In a bit over a decade as right-hand partner to King Juice owner Tim Kezman, Jeff Outlaw helped steer a modest offshoot of King's core copacking operation, the Calypso Lemonade brand, to prominent role as alt-bev and sale to private-equity house Mason Wells, which installed David Klavsons as ceo. In the 14 months since he moved on, the garrulous Outlaw has been uncharacteristically quiet, at least to outside world. "I played more golf and have written more songs," he recounted today, referring to thriving country music sideline, mainly with songwriting partner Phil Vassar, whose popular podcast Songs from the Cellar Outlaw now has had a chance to take occasional role creative-directing, too. In Mar, he signed multiyear exclusive worldwide publishing contract with Sony.

A pair of Whole Foods regions and Wegmans. Minna Sparkling Tea founder Ryan Fortwendel certainly wasn't expecting likes of those during pandemic crisis. But they've proved solid additions to retail footprint in eventful year in which 2-year-old line of canned unsweetened sparkling teas has rethought strategy, brought on key staffing additions and dialed up its ecomm biz. And while early stages of pandemic seemed inappropriate time for flavor addition, co has decided time is finally ripe: that's Cherry Cacao flavor that was to be showcased at Expo West, had that show occurred. Drawing on Fortwendel's nostalgia for the cherry sodas he was allowed to have all too infrequently as a kid, it joins lineup of Citrus Black Tea (orange mango), Tropical Green Tea (pineapple passion fruit) and Lime Hibiscus Tea (with rooibos), all certified as organic. With its green tea base, some have told him Cherry Cacao tastes like a no-sugar Dr Pepper, Fortwendel reported.

Several prominent UK and US supermarket chains have removed some coconut water and coconut oil brands from their shelves after animal rights group PETA convinced them the coconuts had been picked on 8 farms in Thailand by trained monkeys who're treated like "coconut-picking machines." Peta (which stands for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) contends that pigtailed macaques are "snatched from the wild and trained to pick up to 1,000 coconuts a day," as BBC reported, compared to human output of about 80 coconuts. So far Waitrose, Ocado, Co-op and Boots chains have said they'll pull offending brands from their shelves and others like Sainsbury have come under pressure to take similar step from Carrie Symonds, the conservationist fiancé of Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who's made it a cause celebre. Tho pressed by Symonds to take action, Tesco responded that neither the private-label nor branded items it carries are connected to offending plantations. As BBC reported, PETA claims to have discovered "monkey schools" where animals are trained to pick fruit, as well as ride bikes or play basketball for the entertainment of tourists. "The animals at these facilities - many of whom are illegally captured as babies - displayed stereotypic behavior indicative of extreme stress," per Peta. Report doesn't identify specific brands but Peta's website at https://investigations.peta.org/monkeys-abused-coconut-milk/ names Thailand's top coconut milk producers Aroy-D and Chaokoh whose products are sold in US at Cost Plus World Market, Ahold's Giant, Food Lion, Stop & Shop and Hannaford Bros chains, and Walgreens Boots Alliance, which carries some at its Walgreens and Duane Reade banners, which have all committed to drop offending items.

Another holdout among boutique soda brands that have been reluctant to offer zero-sugar entries that might compromise their lush taste profiles has come over: Ginseng Up. The Worcester, Mass-based marketer and copacker that's long built its core line around ingredient styled as "the root of all power" has turned to monk fruit as solution to offering no- and low-sugar entries to augment core line whose fruitier entries can run to 140 calories per 12-oz bottle. They use cane sugar as sweetener.

Stumptown Coffee, which has opened cafes within Ace Hotels in Portland, Ore, NY and other markets, has opened its first overseas unit in an Ace Hotel that just opened in Kyoto (city identified with cold-brew process). Portland, Ore-based unit of JDE Peet's says it culminates years of planning and suffered Covid-related delays. Meanwhile, in grocery, co has launched refrigerated Cold Brew Concentrate, 2X liquid packed in embossed 25.4-oz brown-glass bottle that resembles those used for olive oil . . . Barfresh Food Group said its anticipated entry into a 3K+-unit QSR chain has been put on hold, presumably because of pandemic. "We have a very good working relationship with this company and we will stay engaged with them as circumstances in their business change," said ceo Riccardo Delle Coste, without identifying prospective partner. To offset hit taken by core foodservice-oriented biz Barfresh has been pushing bottled smoothie line at schools, recall (BBI, Apr 9) . . . 7-Eleven has broug

With healthcare workers, first responders and other local heroes reaping deserved bounty of adulation during pandemic crisis, Talking Rain found that its Cheers to Heroes promo struck a chord this spring. On social media activation front, Cheers to Heroes has been keystone of spring programming by celebrating "everyday hometown heroes." This spring, Seattle-based co ramped up influencer program to add nearly 50 organic influencers to promote program, said vp Nina Morrison. Nominations closed on Jun 14, with participation blowing thru anticipated 500-1K entries to hit 3,181, she indicated. Those are being vetted to shortlist of 3 with vote on winner slated this month and winner announcement early next month. Winners get $10K and those who nominated them can get $500.