• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Skip to navigation
Close Ad

The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

  • Home
  • News
    • Alternative Protein
    • Business of Food
    • Connected Kitchen
    • COVID-19
    • Delivery & Commerce
    • Foodtech
    • Food Waste
    • Future of Drink
    • Future Food
    • Future of Grocery
    • Podcasts
    • Startups
    • Restaurant Tech
    • Robotics, AI & Data
  • Spoon Plus
  • Events
  • Newsletter
  • Connect
    • Send us a Tip
    • Spoon Newsletters
    • Custom Events
    • Slack
    • RSS
  • Jobs
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Consulting
  • Membership
The Spoon
  • Home
  • News
    • Alternative Protein
    • Business of Food
    • Connected Kitchen
    • Foodtech
    • Food Waste
    • Future Food
    • Future of Grocery
    • Restaurant Tech
    • Robotics, AI & Data
  • Spoon Plus Central
  • Newsletter
  • Events
  • Jobs
  • Slack
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Become a Member

Maker of Dirty Lemon Gets $15M Investment Led by Coca-Cola

by Chris Albrecht
December 21, 2018January 8, 2019Filed under:
  • Delivery & Commerce
  • Funding
  • Future of Drink
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Iris Nova, the company behind Dirty Lemon water, announced today that it has received a $15 million seed round led by soft drink giant Coca-Cola, as well as a host of celebrities including Kate Hudson, Sophia Bush, Alex Rodriguez and Scooter Braun (Justin Bieber’s manager).

Dirty Lemon made a splash (sorry) in the industry with its SMS-based direct sales model that allows customers to order the bougie water via text message. According to the funding press announcement, Iris Nova has sold over 2 million bottles of Dirty Lemon since 2015 and processed 90% of orders entirely via text message.

Pay by text for Dirty Lemon water

In addition to slinging Dirty Lemon drinks with unconventional flavors like Tumeric, Charcoal, and Collagen (though no more CBD), Iris Nova also launched Drug Store, a cashierless retail store in New York city where people pay via text message on the honor system.

Sales of traditional sodas are declining, and this investment caps off a year that saw Coke diversifying beyond its carbonated cola roots. Earlier this week, Coca-Cola led a $10 million series A round in restaurant POS software company Omnivore. In August, it spent $5.1 billion to acquire Costa Coffee, one of Europe’s biggest coffee chains. And back in September it was even rumored that Coca-Cola was in talks with Canadian marijuana producer Aurora Cannabis to create beverages.

So Coke’s investment in Iris Nova makes sense. It broadens the portfolio of brands Coke is involved with, and now an old dog like Coke can learn a bunch of new tricks from an upstart like Iris Nova. Not only from a tech standpoint, but also in creating direct relationships with consumers, new sales channels and branding to maybe make grabbing a Coke and a smile hip again.


Related

Get the Spoon in your inbox

Just enter your email and we’ll take care of the rest:

Find us on some of these other platforms:

  • Apple Podcasts
  • Spotify
Tagged:
  • Coca-Cola
  • Coke
  • Dirty Lemon
  • Iris Nova

Post navigation

Previous Post South Korea’s Woowa Bros. Gets $320M Investment to Build More Robots
Next Post With the Growth of “Bleeding” Burgers, How are the Tofurky’s of the World Faring?

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Get The Spoon in Your Inbox

Subscribe to Our Podcast!

Subscribe in iTunes or listen on Spotify.

The Spoon Food Tech Weekly: About That Bloomberg Article
Podcast: The Bloomberg Alt-Meat Hullabaloo With Rachel Konrad
New Alt Protein and Bioinnovation Hubs Are Popping Up From NYC to Israel
Meati Opens Up ‘Mega Ranch’ Production Facility, Plans to Produce “Tens of Millions of Pounds” of Fungi-Based Meat
SJW Robotics Raises $2M as It Eyes Launch of Autonomous Robotic Restaurants This Spring

Footer

  • About
  • Sponsor the Spoon
  • The Spoon Events
  • Spoon Plus

© 2016–2023 The Spoon. All rights reserved.

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.
 

Loading Comments...