Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Melissa Martinelli. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Alright, Melissa thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Almost every entrepreneur we know has considered donating a portion of their sales to an organization or cause – how did you make the decision of whether to donate? We’d love to hear the backstory if you’re open to sharing the details.
Over the next three months, we will launch a new flavor — Blueberry Lemonade– of our sustainable sparkling functional beverages. We are truly making (blueberry) lemonade out of lemons by donating all sale proceeds to WRRAP (Women’s Reproductive Rights Assistance Project).
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
My path to becoming a food & beverage entrepreneur is an unlikely one, with the foundation of a deep commitment to immigrants’ rights and migrant communities. As climate change is one of the biggest causes of forced migration; and food waste is one of the largest contributors to climate change, it was a natural step for me to pivot from a dedicated immigration lawyer to a food waste warrior.
While in Europe four years ago, after I spent some time in Greece representing Syrian refugees in their legal matters, I came upon a fresh whey drink, offered to me by my husband and my in-laws in Austria. It was uniquely satisfying, and the main ingredient— liquid whey, the co-product of yogurt and cheese-making– piqued my curiosity. When we returned to Massachusetts, I learned that 90% of the milk that goes into cheese-making, and 2/3 of the milk that goes into Greek yogurt making, ends up as fresh liquid whey during the fermentation process, naturally packed with the full spectrum of electrolytes (sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, zinc), a generous portion of B vitamins, and gut beneficial acids. My interest went from curiosity to obsession when I learned that less than half of this “liquid gold” (100 billion pounds-worth in the US! Annually!) is fully utilized, and it most often is hauled away to digesters, or fed to livestock.
In the same way that managing the refugee crisis in the U.S. and abroad was a matter that felt large and overwhelming, despite the small role I had the fortune of playing, climate change also felt almost too big to tackle. In that moment of reflection, Superfrau was born, with a mission to empower individuals to make healthy and sustainable choices when it comes to what they consume. By diverting the fresh whey from going to waste and upcycling it into our satisfying and nutrient-dense beverages, we are offering an opportunity for consumers to fight food waste and climate change as part of their daily health routine.
We launched our first line of beverages in the Boston market in 2019 and received tremendous feedback. As we looked to scale-up our operations, however, we knew we would need to reformulate to make Superfrau shelf-stable. We had just received a grant to hire a product developer when the first shutdown in March 2020 was announced. We took that time to reformulate and immerse ourselves in and learn about an industry in which we were complete outsiders. With a single asset of a refrigerated van, we were also able to help other local food entrepreneurs from our commercial kitchen to deliver food, and we took weekly trips to hospitals and shelters delivering meals from Off Their Plate to frontline workers.
By 2021, we were able to raise a pre-seed round with the support of Gary Hirshberg, the founder of Stonyfield, who understood the benefits of liquid whey (beyond protein) as well as the waste issue more than anyone. With this small runway, we were able to invest in opportunities to divert more whey and bring more nutrition to more people. We officially launched our new product line in September 2021, became Upcycled Certified, and launched into Whole Foods Market stores in the New England in February of this year. We are now in over 100 retail stores throughout the region, and beginning to gain traction online on our own site, and with partnerships with other online platforms like GoPuff, Urban Outfitters, and Bubble.
As a woman-owned business, it is our responsibility and desire to develop a team committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion that will further our mission to fight food waste and climate change by rescuing the powerful nutrition that would otherwise be lost in our supply chain. We believe this commitment will have reverberating, and generational impact throughout underserved communities and beyond.
Can you talk to us about manufacturing? How’d you figure it all out? We’d love to hear the story.
We started very humbly in our tiny Cambridge, Massachusetts livingroom (our kitchen was too small, so our product development expanded first into our living room, and then into a shared commercial kitchen for women and minority owned food businesses in Boston. Our product initially required refrigeration at all times, so my first days and weeks at the commercial kitchen were spent in the “cold room,” which does not do the space justice, because it really felt more like an ice box! I remember the first time my partner and I scaled up our recipe there. We spent over 12 hours in that freezing room. It was at once joyful to see our product poured by hand into hundreds of bottles, and exhausting to stand on our feet for that long, working with cold liquids in cold temperatures. When we finally finished, we walked out of the building with satisfied and aching bodies to find that our car had been towed!
As we were developing a new supply chain (rescuing perceived waste from yogurt and cheese makers to make our products, we went to great lengths just to get our primary ingredient: fresh liquid whey. I would drive all over New England in a borrowed refrigerated truck repair van that had an electric fridge in the back to collect whey from various cheese and yogurt makers I came to know throughout the region. Often mistaken as the refrigerator repair person, it was always fun to explain who I was or what I was doing.
On the morning my partner and I got married, I had to make a quick run to pick up whey at a local farm. There, I collected the whey and picked some wild flowers for our ceremony! While on this journey, there has been little rest, but lots of highs and lows, challenges and disappointments… all of which we took as lessons. One of my main takeaways from developing the recipe in our house, and then manufacturing it myself was that we needed to simplify our process if it was going to be scalable and successful, and one of the most important aspects would be getting OUT of the cold chain. With a small grant from Pepsico, we hired product developers who helped us commercialize our product by making it shelf-stable (not require refrigeration for handling). This was a game changer for us and something that helped us eventually launch online / direct-to-consumer last fall, and eventually into select Whole Foods Market stores this year.
How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?
We try to really engage with our target market and listen to their feedback, needs, and interests. We do this both digitally (on Instagram and TikTok) through our brand ambassador program as well as in real life. We engage our audience by asking for feedback on topics ranging from growth strategies to new flavor launches. And now we’re opening a month long retail pop up shop in our community featuring all locally crafted food and beverage products called Super Local Snacks. It’s designed to be a destination for all the most innovative and delicious local snacks. The community can engage with brand founders during “Meet the Maker” nights, and learn and experience our products on a deeper level. After two long years of Covid-related restrictions, we are thrilled to have the opportunity to genuinely connect with our customers. With Gen-Z consumers, this is particularly important, but it’s simply just part of our reason for being at Superfrau.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.drinksuperfrau.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drinksuperfrau/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drinksuperfrau/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/drinksuperfrau/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/drinksuperfrau?lang=en
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@drinksuperfrau?lang=en
Image Credits
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