[00:00:10] Ray Latif: Hello, friends, and thanks for tuning in to Taste Radio, the number one podcast for anyone building a business in food or beverage. I'm Ray Latif, the editor and producer of Taste Radio, and with my co-host for this episode, John Craven and Mike Schneider. Well, I think this is the first, as far as I know, recording one of our episodes in a hotel room. Now, we may have recorded in hotel rooms in the past, but maybe not in Chicago, where we are right now. Wicker Park, more specifically. Next up, parking garage. Mike's gotta get to the airport, but...
[00:00:44] John Craven: Subway platform.
[00:00:45] Ray Latif: Oh yeah, we should have recorded on the train. I don't think that's such a good idea. CTA. No, we're recording from my hotel room because last night we held our Taste Radio 2026 meetup at Pilot Project Brewing in Logan Square and what an event it was. We had about 120 people at the event and the folks at Pilot Project Brewing were so gracious and welcoming. I felt like the energy was pretty over the top. It was just a really fun, exciting event and got to meet folks that we've never had an opportunity to sit down with or speak with before. A lot of brands that are brand new to me. Ooh. Yeah. Or just brand new. Or just brand new. Rain outside, sunshine inside.
[00:01:28] Mike Schneider: It was a great night.
[00:01:28] Ray Latif: It was a little rainy outside. It was fun. Huge thanks once again to Pilot Project Brewing, Jordan Radke, Dan Abel, Mary Abel, who were just outstanding from beginning to end and really helped make the event a great success and a really entertaining and engaging one for anyone who attended. Of course, a huge thanks to our national partners, the Angel Group, Vibrant Ingredients, Belay Solutions, and a big thanks to our local partner for the event, Battle Bars, Alex Witt, the founder and CEO, legend. What a great guy. Yeah, Alex, thanks so much. Yeah. I sat down with Jordan Radke, Dan Abel, Alex Witt, and Adam Spriggs, who's a founding member of the Angel Group. for conversations that we'll be featuring in a future episode of Taste Radio. Yeah, they're undergoing a pretty significant brand refresh and a little bit of a formulation refresh for their crispy protein bars. We talked about that in our conversation, but yeah, it's interesting because Battle Bars, the first time I sat down with Alex was about six years ago and it was for an episode of Elevator Talk and he's definitely lived the life of an entrepreneur and he's going through some pretty cool changes right now. Stressful, but he definitely talked a lot about the ups and downs, the rollercoaster of being an entrepreneur. I think the first thing he said was, hey, if you're a founder, raise your hand. He goes, if you're a founder who wants to jump in front of a car because of how stressful this business is, raise your hand.
[00:03:11] Mike Schneider: And people raised two hands. It was a really mature conversation. I think the self-awareness and the just ability to look at your brand from the outside instead of from your heart is a really hard thing to do and something that they've had to face when they're looking at, you know, the marks and would someone buy it with the skull and crossbones on the on the package. It was it was a really great conversation. Yeah. I look forward to listeners.
[00:03:36] Ray Latif: I feel like the insights that he shared about who's buying protein bars right now. I think he said it was like 70 to 75% of protein bar consumers are women. He's like, well, if we've got this really masculine, that's for dudes.
[00:03:52] John Craven: Yeah.
[00:03:52] Ray Latif: I'm holding their old package in my hand and they got a skull with a lightning bolt going through it. I've seen their new packaging. It definitely skews more feminine.
[00:03:59] Mike Schneider: That one gives me Death Wish coffee vibes. Yeah, it does. And I mean, he's a Navy guy. It looks like a, you know, it looks like something you could pull out of your pack.
[00:04:07] John Craven: It's a cool logo.
[00:04:07] Mike Schneider: Yeah. I like it. I've always been a fan.
[00:04:09] Ray Latif: Yeah. One thing I did before the event, I got here, Davey, earlier, and there's a Foxtrot Market right around the corner from our hotel here. And I was so high on Foxtrot like everyone else was about three, four years ago. Mike Lovatola was one of the co-founders and CEO of the company. I mean, that was just one of the most hyped companies out there. It all kind of came falling down pretty quickly. Not exactly sure what happened, but just for context, Foxtrot was an elevated convenience store that would deliver products to folks in the Chicago area in a pretty quick amount of time. I don't know if it was like an hour, but it was... quick delivery, premium products, premium selection, and just intended to be something along the lines of, and these are my words, the Erewhon of convenience stores. And after they shut down, they were acquired out of foreclosure for, if you can believe this, $2.2 million by a venture capital firm called Further Point Enterprises. So Mike Lavatola came back to spearhead that relaunch, and they've got a handful of stores back in the Chicagoland area, including the one here in Wicker Park. The selection is pretty amazing. They've got an Erewhon-ish type selection of beverages, snacks, frozen meals. So when you go in there, it definitely feels like what you would have expected from the old Foxtrot. Gonna head over there after this. Nice, nice. So I grammed as much as I could gram when I was at the store. You were a gramming machine. A gramming machine. And a couple of the brands that I grammed showed up at our event last night. Well, the founders brought their brands. One of them includes a company called Five Corners Beverage Company. The co-founder is Benno Nelson. Of course. And they have three different products. We've got two here. The one I tried, and this is pretty darn amazing if you haven't tried this yet, is their Salted Lemonade variety. So Five Corners describes itself as the non-alcoholic sparkling cocktail brand, and they feature the five foundational tastes, salty, sour, savory, bitter, and sweet. It's sometimes all at once. and draw inspiration from the Five Corners of the globe, north, south, east, west, and home. Hence, Five Corners Beverage Company. Have you tried this yet? We tried it last night.
[00:06:38] Mike Schneider: We tried it last night, yeah. There's also the one you don't have on the table here. So you've got the salted lemonade in your hand, and then you've got the sangrita, which is tomato, chili powder, and citrus. It's almost like somebody spilled their orange juice in your in your tomato juice, and that one's really interesting. And then there's a pickle variety, too. The pickleback. The pickleback, yeah. It rhymes with Nickelback. I never thought I'd like something that rhymed with Nickelback.
[00:07:04] Ray Latif: So out of all the stuff I grammed on Wednesday, the five-corner salted lemonade got the most engagement. Everyone wants to know what this is all about. So this one has citrus, black salt, and cumin. Darren Revell messaged me and he said, you just stick with salted lemonade. Why'd you add the cumin? He's one of those guys that doesn't like the cumin. I gotta try this again. You guys mind if I open this?
[00:07:24] Mike Schneider: Go for it, Ray.
[00:07:25] Ray Latif: Okay, I'm gonna crack this open.
[00:07:26] Mike Schneider: Lemonade's so hot right now between, you know, you got salted lemonade in your hand there, Five Corners, you got Sean from Goldie out there running around with his lemonade.
[00:07:34] Ray Latif: Sean had to look away because I almost got lemonade all over, not just the laptop, but these human ears as well. Yeah, so the thing that really just blows your mind is the aroma on this. It smells like you're walking into a Middle Eastern, Mediterranean grocery store. You know when you pop into those places and the spice just hits you as soon as you open the door? Yeah, I love that. That is this beverage. It's definitely different. Yeah, it's really complex, lots of different flavors. Fantastic stuff.
[00:08:02] Mike Schneider: This reminds me of the amount of cumin in the initial Talkback shortbread cookies. Remember when we were going to have the cumin variety and it's like a lot of cumin.
[00:08:12] Ray Latif: So I told Benno, I was like, I have not tasted a product like this. I've never tasted a beverage like this. And I really think he's on the right track in terms of the formulations and the varieties that they're selling, because You think about the non-alcoholic cocktail space, and it's so many of the same flavors. It's just the same standard, margarita, mule. And if you are looking for complexity, like if you're looking for a cocktail that has a lot of different ingredients that isn't a same cookie cutter type of product, if you want true differentiation, I think you got to go a little off the beaten path, sometimes way off the beaten path. This one's way off the path for sure. Yeah. Another brand that I saw at Foxtrot is a brand called Aire, and I'm completely mispronouncing this, but it's A-I-R-E, described as a Mexican sparkling tonic. Hector Diaz is the founder of the company, and I met him last night, and man, oh man, this product blew me away. They have a couple different varieties. I'm forgetting which the second one is, but this is their Hibiscus Con Limon. Crack that open, Mike, if you haven't already.
[00:09:27] Mike Schneider: Can do, Ray. Ooh, a little fizzy.
[00:09:33] Ray Latif: Little fizzy. How'd we do? We're doing okay. It's rich. Yeah, so this reminds me sort of as a guillotine type product, but also salted, also salted, but it is A little bit more complex, a little less carbonated, and it smells like chocolate. Doesn't it?
[00:09:55] Mike Schneider: Yeah, you get like some serious chocolate vibes here because there is natural chocolate flavor in it. It's mostly pomegranate juice and prickly pear juice and hibiscus extract.
[00:10:06] John Craven: Yeah, also pretty nice. Kind of interesting. Four Corners and this air brand, however we pronounce it. are both in 8.4 ounce kind of slim cans. Not exactly a super popular size. Also wonder about just value proposition compared to 12 ounce or whatever that probably competes with.
[00:10:25] Ray Latif: I think it speaks to what consumers are expecting out of flavor. You know, the smaller varieties are more in line, I think, with smaller cocktails, right? Right. You don't want a 16 ounce can of cocktails, do you?
[00:10:37] John Craven: Well, no, but I mean, this, you know, it's positioned as a Mexican sparkling tonic. Yeah, but mostly consumed as a cocktail, I would assume. I wonder. I mean, it's I don't know if you tried their mango flavor. The mango one is phenomenal. I mean, no offense to the hibiscus cone limon, but the mango variety with chili is like, I mean, that stuff's phenomenal.
[00:10:58] Ray Latif: I honestly, I thought I had some here. I thought I brought a can. You probably drank it last night. Maybe I did in a haze. I probably drank it last night. But yeah, the mango con chile, I hugged. I hugged Hector. It was so damn good. It is one of the best beverages I've had all year.
[00:11:13] Mike Schneider: Somebody pointed out, I mean, I grammed it last night too, just like you did, Ray, and somebody popped into my DMs and said something I wasn't expecting, which was the name needs work because who wants to pay for air? That's cute.
[00:11:29] Ray Latif: Bye. Another product that I was really surprised to see at Foxtrot and I thought was a revamp of a brand that we know and love is a brand called Ruby. Ruby comes in a 12 ounce long neck glass bottle. It's described as fine hibiscus tea. Front of pack is ruby in cursive, vertically laid out on the label. I could have sworn this was Noah Wunsch's brand.
[00:11:58] Mike Schneider: Ruby hibiscus.
[00:11:58] Ray Latif: I think he called it quits a while back.
[00:12:01] Mike Schneider: But that's like deja vu all over again.
[00:12:02] Ray Latif: Yeah. I don't know if they bought the assets or the IP.
[00:12:06] Mike Schneider: Probably not.
[00:12:07] Ray Latif: Yeah. So the ingredients in this are water, honey, hibiscus, ginger, and pink salt. That's it.
[00:12:12] John Craven: I mean, hibiscus, I mean, it's kind of like rooibos tea. Like every once in a while we see a brand that tries to do it. And I don't know, you know, it's sort of a polarizing flavor where you're all in on hibiscus. Like you can't make a skew. a flavored skew that's gonna not taste like hibiscus. This seems like it's going for more of like a... premium drinker. I mean, that's the vibe it gives off with the glass bottle and the kind of script logo. So who knows? I was expecting some carbonation.
[00:12:41] Ray Latif: There's not in here. It's yeah, it does look like a carbonated format. Yeah, it's a still beverage. And I don't know what the day part usage is when you would be drinking this.
[00:12:52] John Craven: I mean, it's classic yeast was like it's an herbal tea. You know, if you want tea without caffeine. Yeah, kind of on the sweeter side. It's got 110 calories. 20-something added grams of sugar, you know, kind of full calorie tea, but yeah, it's good stuff.
[00:13:07] Ray Latif: Yeah, well for me, let's go through a couple more products that I got from Foxtrot Market. Oh, yes. Barbet is a flavored sparkling water brand made in Canada. I saw two varieties. This one is their Love Bite. Tart pink grapefruit and a cheeky bite of ginger with earthy juniper. 40 calories per can. This is a 12 ounce wide body can. You don't really see a lot of 40 calorie sparkling waters. This one has 6 grams of sugar. So I might think about this more as a soda than a sparkling water, but let's take a taste. Beautiful packaging. People on the Grams were in love with this beautiful packaging of Barbet. It almost looks like a The watermelon.
[00:13:48] Mike Schneider: It does. It has Barbasol vibes. It's Art Deco Barbasol. You know, doesn't it? That's funny, right? Yeah. Art Deco Barbasol.
[00:13:56] Ray Latif: It's today and moments that date Ray. Yeah. You can look up an old Barbasol can and you'll know what I'm talking about. for people who like pain while shaving. It smells amazing. The aroma on this, the grapefruit is so, so beautiful on the nose. This feels like kind of a sibling of like a spindrift almost. Yeah, you would never know there's 40 calories in this. It tastes like and it acts like a sparkling water. It's good.
[00:14:19] Mike Schneider: Bubbles in Canada.
[00:14:20] Ray Latif: It's from Canada, yeah. All right, we got one more Beverage Company we got three snackish type products.
[00:14:25] Mike Schneider: Which one do you want to go with? Do you want to go with beverage? Oh, I tried beanies last night. Yeah, same. Stuff is great. Especially the wasabi one. Coated soybeans. Coated soybeans.
[00:14:32] Ray Latif: Can't even speak. I did not get that at Foxtrot. We got those at the event last night. Beanies is the maker of coated soybeans.
[00:14:41] Mike Schneider: Coated soybeans, which is very easy to say. What are they coated with? This one is coated with rice flour. It's like the original flavor, but they had also like one that was coated with cinnamon. There's nori, like nori seaweed. That one was awesome.
[00:14:55] Ray Latif: They're crunchy. These reminded me, just the package reminded me of Biena's edamame products.
[00:15:00] Mike Schneider: I think we talked about that while we were crunching these last night too, and I think it's a really good analog. They're different though. They're a different product, but they behave kind of similarly. Same use occasion and stuff. Yeah.
[00:15:13] Ray Latif: I saw this protein bar at Foxtrot. It's called Unhinged. It is a caffeine plus protein bar. First I've ever seen. Really standout packaging. It's in this shiny silver wrap. And this is their chocolate and coffee variety. I have not tried this, but again, got some messages on the gram talking about how people love this product. All it needs is electrolytes.
[00:15:43] Mike Schneider: Perfect Jimbro.
[00:15:45] Ray Latif: You know, it's funny. We haven't seen more of these. Right. Because we've seen caffeine David Protein in beverage. Yeah. Coffee. There are caffeine bars out there. Which ones? Caffeine David Protein? I'm sure there are. Well, there is one in my hand. There it is, Ray. I'm sure it's not the first. It may not be the first, but I'm surprised we haven't been seeing more of these out there. Again, given that we've seen so much caffeine David Protein.
[00:16:10] Mike Schneider: Caffeine David Protein. We're going to get some Honey Mama Stumptown collab from Christy Goldsby soon. She's sending it to us. Is that protein though? Yeah, that's protein bar. There's protein in Honey Mama? They've got David Protein line, Ray. Haven't you seen their protein line? Where have you been?
[00:16:23] Ray Latif: You haven't seen Honey Mama's protein to be fair. So good. I love that brand But I am NOT the number one super fan like the guy I'm looking at now. I definitely hoard it So yes, keep it away. You love it and you want to you know, caress it cuddle it. Yes. I want to eat it, right? Yeah, I was gonna say it's your baby. No, but it's not your chai, baby Wow, great segway. You like that segway? Okay, I'm saying chai, baby because I'm holding a product in my hand I guess it's called chai, baby. The maker of the product is Freeman House And this is a micro brew chai that comes in a 12 ounce plastic bottle and it's made with Oatly. Literally the Oatly brand is on the front of pack here. Yeah.
[00:17:04] John Craven: That seems kind of unnecessary in 2026. Why is that? I don't know. I mean, at this point, do we view Oatly as the same premium thing that we once did? I don't think so.
[00:17:14] Ray Latif: Yeah, but maybe they're getting some sort of deal on the Oatly.
[00:17:16] John Craven: Powered by Oatly.
[00:17:17] Ray Latif: Maybe they're getting a deal by putting the Oatly logo on the front.
[00:17:20] John Craven: Well, either way. I mean, it's, again, I would just question if that's a thing that helps or... I don't know, it just sort of immediately gives vibes that it's flavored milk, you know, which I guess technically, sure, a nice chai kind of is, but it just feels like it de-emphasizes the actual chai kind of quick to me. Yeah, this is chai latte.
[00:17:42] Ray Latif: Subconsciously, at least. Well, we haven't tried it yet. You can actually drink this. On its own or you can heat it up. Does it give you permission to add alcohol to? Possible it's also available as a concentrate according to the pack your 160 calories 19 grams of sugar and 13 grams more drinking.
[00:18:01] John Craven: Come on.
[00:18:01] Ray Latif: All right, hold on Very good.
[00:18:05] John Craven: Yeah, I mean that's a good solid bottle of chai definitely tastes pretty fresh I would say yeah, I don't know if there's a
[00:18:14] Ray Latif: quick expiration date on this one. And I didn't even shake it up that well. I mean, you can see bits of like what looks like vanilla bean in the bottom of it. Yeah. And on top of the yellow screw cap here, this is nine one. So this is a pretty perishable product. I think the expiration date is what? A little over two weeks from now. So yeah. Good stuff. It is good stuff. Last one is a brand called Jilly's Jerky, David Protein packed serious snack. There, I think they're tagline, they have a lot of taglines here, but this one is no joke beef jerky. A protein-packed serious snack, no joke beef jerky. Jilly's jerky, their logo looks like a smiley face, but there's two J's for eyes. Look at that sassy little Jilly on the back too. Yeah, as a boy.
[00:18:58] Mike Schneider: Get a load of that.
[00:18:59] Ray Latif: Yeah, with his dad. There's Jilly, and there's Donny, and there's his dad, and it looks like a photo from maybe 1989? I'm gonna go with 1989. Beef, chipotle pepper, distilled vinegar, water, red pepper flakes, salt, onion, garlic spices. Love the ingredient list. Ready to try some beef there, Mike? Beef and chai or natural? Yeah, beef and chai. I can't wait. Okay. We're going to save the sampling of this for the next episode. Yeah, let's do that in the studio. Yeah. I imagine it's only a matter of time before we see a new brand called Hall Pass at Foxtrot. Currently, Foxtrot is sold exclusively or will be sold exclusively at Walmart. Who makes this Hall Pass product and what is it, Mike? Do you know? I'm going to answer that question for you. Thanks, Ray. It happens to be the newest brand. from RX Bar and David founder, Peter Rahal Hall. Yes. So Hall Pass makes better for you, classically inspired chocolate bars. So they have peanut butter cups, chocolatey candy pieces, and peanut cream, crispy wafers. So peanut cups. I think we can figure out what that is. Chocolatey candy pieces. I might know what those are. And peanut cream, crispy wafers. And what would that be? Okay. So I was a little surprised by this, but I guess it's a natural extension because each single-serve package has 70 calories and 1 gram of sugar. Kind of in line with what David is doing in that the protein bars have 150 calories and I think, is it 0 grams of sugar? Seemingly the right brand for the right time for the right moment. Haven't had a chance to taste these yet, but there's a lot of hype already about them launching once again in Walmart on August 29th.
[00:20:49] John Craven: Yeah, you got a little bit of flack on Twitter for posting what appears to be an AI image. Why did you get flack for that? Because there's blurry text on the image promoting the launch of that? Okay, cuz people want some designer to render the package at least well a certain someone that you mentioned earlier Aka Darren Rovell was in a little bit of a back-and-forth with Peter. So really yes, he does that Darren was like looks cool, but why not just hire a designer to actually do the image you're sharing and Peter basically claimed it was kind of intentional for rage bait purposes
[00:21:30] Ray Latif: You know what? That also sounds like Peter. You know, hey, whatever. It's us. Both smart guys. Both know what they're doing. So, yeah. $1.82 per bar. Would you buy that for $1.82, Mike? I try for $1.82. You try it? Yeah. Okay. Well, you don't know how it tastes yet, so how can you say if you'd buy it again?
[00:21:48] Mike Schneider: Right.
[00:21:49] Ray Latif: Yeah. I've really enjoyed Chicago. I hate leaving the city so soon. This is just a fantastic, thriving place. And the CPG scene here is just immense and amazing. And if we didn't get a chance to talk at length yesterday, please reach out to us here at BevNetNosh and Taste Radio in Brewmound. We want to continue the conversation. And for folks who couldn't make the event, just continue to stay in touch. We definitely missed you, but we definitely want to talk to you and we want to see if we can help you build your brand, scale your brand in any way possible. And that also goes for folks that will be attending our upcoming events in San Diego and San Francisco. San Diego on September 15th, San Francisco on September 17th, and London on October 21st. If you're interested in attending any of those events, head to Taste Radio.com slash meetups. Thank you once again, and we'll see you at the next event. That brings us to the end of this episode of Taste Radio. Thank you so much for listening. Taste Radio is a production of BevNET.com, Incorporated. Our audio engineer for Taste Radio is Joe Cracci. Our technical director is Joshua Pratt, and our video editor is Ryan Galang. Our social marketing manager is Amanda Smerlinski, and our designer is Amanda Huang. Just a reminder, if you like what you hear on Taste Radio, please share the podcast with friends and colleagues. And of course, we would love it if you could review us on the Apple Podcasts app or your listening platform of choice. Check us out on Instagram. Our handle is bevnettasteradio. As always, for questions, comments, ideas for future podcasts, please send us an email to ask at Taste Radio.com. On behalf of the entire Taste Radio team, thank you for listening, and we'll talk to you next time.
[00:23:35] John Craven: you
