VANCOUVER, Canada — Koios Beverage Corp. has expanded its beverage product offerings by developing a product line of specialty ground coffee, enhanced with unique ingredients shown to provide certain benefits in areas to include brain function, adrenal function, and skin appearance.
This development follows the release of the Company’s Fit Soda™ functional beverage products earlier in the Company’s 2020 fiscal year, (which began in June, 2019) as an expansion of Koios’ product offerings to its expanding customer base.
With Koios’s strong distribution footprint between storefronts in the Company’s existing retail partnerships and relationships with leading distribution agencies, the recently-developed specialty coffee products will benefit from near-immediate exposure to a retail audience in the United States.
Following growth of the specialty coffee segment in recent years, specialty coffee now represents approximately 60% of all coffee consumed in the United States based on a study conducted in 20181.
This demand is reinforced by another 2018 study, which concluded that small coffee shops were able to realize an advantage over larger competitors by offering specialty coffees that cannot be obtained elsewhere2.
While coffee is a functional beverage in and of itself, it is increasingly being used as a medium for delivering functional benefits both because caffeine can enhance the effects of certain ingredients, and coffee consumption patterns are often frequent and habitual3. The Company has sought to leverage these advantages in the development of its new line of specialty coffees.
As of this writing, Koios has developed two varieties of specialty coffee:
Creativity Blend: This coffee is enhanced with two different types of mushrooms; hericium erinaceus (“lion’s mane”) and inonotus obliquus (“chaga”). The lion’s mane mushroom variety has been reported to enhance brain function (particularly when combined with caffeine) and cause adaptogenic stress reduction, and chaga mushrooms are an adaptogen that have been reported to improve users’ adrenal function. Lion’s mane mushroom is used in the Company’s KOIOS™ branded beverages, and both lion’s mane and chaga mushroom are used in KOIOS™ branded stick packs and supplement powders. [NTD: can a source be added for the effects of lion’s mane and Chaga mushroom? – It would strengthen this section. Also most people aren’t going to know what adaptogenic or adaptogen means, can a simpler word be used or can it be explained what it means?]
Beauty Blend: This coffee is enhanced with collagen, a protein that is reported to have benefits that include improving the appearance of a user’s skin. The practice of combining collagen with coffee has seen great popularity in recent years as a beauty-enhancing measure. An October 2017 segment of the talk show Dr. Oz discussed this practice, including the possible difficulty of obtaining collagen through traditional food sources4.
The Company believes that these coffee products serve what is colloquially known as a “white space” (i.e. an opportunity from a void of unmet and unarticulated needs) in the functional beverages segment. By offering these products alongside the Company’s existing product line, Koios anticipates it will deliver even greater value to its growing client base. The Koios ground coffee products will initially be made available to the Company’s base of online store customers and subscribers, which currently consists of more than 60,000 individuals. With this large audience of existing customers, there is significant potential for immediate revenues from initial trial purchases, which will have favourable profit margins as direct-to-consumer sales. Shortly thereafter, it is planned for the coffee products to also be made available through Amazon, as well as Koios’ brick-and-mortar retail partners.
Koios CEO Chris Miller commented, “Savvy consumers are beginning to realize that their morning coffee is a perfect medium for gaining things other than energy and alertness through specialty coffee products. Our existing product lineup enhances brain function through the soft beverage medium, but we realized there was significant value to be had by applying our philosophies and expertise to coffee as well. We are very excited to get initial reactions to our new coffee products from some of our more than 60,000 existing customers and subscribers from our online store. We anticipate this initial launch will have great success leading up to the availability of our ground coffee products to the general public.”
The Company is also pleased to announce that it has retained the services of IDR Marketing, Inc. (“IDR”) to provide public relations strategies, brand awareness, financial and digital marketing services to the Company. The marketing awareness services provided by IDR will be aimed at maintaining and building the profile of Koios through traditional press initiatives, advertising directives, and social media strategies.
Regarding the Company’s engagement of IDR, Koios CEO Chris Miller stated, “With the recent milestones we have achieved, we believe it is time to deliver our message to existing and prospective shareholders to maximize our value. IDR has a proven track record of creating media, content, and wide-scale distribution in the microcap space. We are confident that IDR will assist us in our efforts to grow our profile in North America.”
IDR is a leading marketing firm and ad agency located in Long Beach, California specializing in the marketing of small and microcap companies. Under the terms of the agreement with IDR as a service provider to the Company, IDR will be paid approximately US $309,000 in cash for its services for a six-month term. IDR, including its principals, does not own any of the Company’s securities.
- https://sba.ubc.ca/blog/industry-overview-coffee-shops-and-coffee-manufacturing
- https://sba.ubc.ca/blog/industry-overview-coffee-shops-and-coffee-manufacturing
- https://www.euromonitor.com/new-approaches-to-functional-coffee/report
- https://www.doctoroz.com/episode/new-collagen-trend-debate
