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Unlike that kid from your hometown who has been MIA since securing an American Eagle partnership and a blue checkmark on Twitter, Jeremy Kim still has the decency to respond to your texts.
He is the co-founder of Nectar, a hard seltzer startup that leveraged a fanbase before selling its first can. By replacing customer service calls with casual text threads, and classic flavors like black cherry and mango with Asian fruits like lychee and yuzu, Nectar is convincing vendors to make room on their shelves for just one more brand of carbonated booze.
Since its launch, the independent brand has secured more than 40,000 followers and made it to 150 locations across California. Nectar has also sealed partnerships with ecommerce vendors GoPuff, TapRm and BevMo!, and will soon be shipping its product to 38 states.
“We’ve shown a lot of our failures and mistakes, and I think a lot of people resonate with this idea of a group of friends going up against big brands,” said Kim, who created the company alongside co-founder John Dalsey and marketing director Geng Wang.
‘Text us for the address’
After starting out by pitching to local liquor stores and receiving a steady stream of rejections, Kim asked TikTok users to text the brand if they were willing to buy the seltzer. After that initial video went viral, Nectar haggled store owners in West Hollywood and Santa Monica to carry 150 boxes on their shelves.
They sold out within an hour, and the brand has since maintained this model in cities across California and New York by inviting TikTok users to text it for the location of its latest liquor store launch.
“People who have never heard of us will walk past and say, ‘Why is there a line down the block for seltzer? That’s crazy,’ and then they get in line, too,” Dalsey said.
When Kim first leaked Nectar’s number on TikTok, he was out of money, burdened with rejection and desperate for reassurance that his idea for Asian-flavored hard seltzers was valid. The hotline, which was created to gauge initial consumer interest, now allows Nectar to receive real-time feedback from consumers.
“People will say, ‘I couldn’t find you in the store,’ so then we’ll let the vendor know that we’re getting buried,” Kim said. “We use the phone number for everything, and every person gets a direct response from me.”
These text threads, which are extensions of the brand’s TikTok personality, have also allowed Nectar to connect with fans in a lighthearted, personal way.
“We’ve built friendships with a lot of these customers,” Kim said. “I don’t think that could have been done over email. They send us some funny things and can get pretty vulnerable.”
Challenging the big players
White Claw still controls the lion’s share of the multibillion-dollar hard seltzer market, but brands like Truly and Bud Light Seltzer don’t lag far behind.
To compete, Nectar is building excitement around the idea of name brand alternatives. For example, Nectar has promised to expand to the first 15 counties that get 300 people to text Nectar for a product launch. This cross-country tour is being tracked on quittheclaw.com.
“We are disrupting the industry by going directly to our consumer and communicating in ways that other brands aren’t doing,” Kim said. “Nectar is for the people. Wherever they want us, we will go.”
