Green smoothies

[dknise]

Aight, I'm taking a chance and throwing this idea out to this shark tank haha. If anyone wishes to execute on this... please message me and include me in the deal! Even if it's a small sliver, cause I'd love to go through the process of creating a product and gaining that experience.

I wake up every morning and start my day off with a green smoothie. Needless to say I put a lot in it...

3 leaves kale
1 cup of spinach
1/2 cucumber
1 banana
1 orange
1 apple
1 scoop whey protein
1 scoop of glutamine

I only shop organic because I think Monsanto is straight poison, so all of the stuff I get is fresh, organic, and locally grown. I also like to support my local businesses. With everyone that I've had who asked me questions about it, they all said it tasted great, they felt amazing, and they would never do it because of the amount of "time and energy" they would need to put into it. The total time and energy is one trip to the store once a week, and about 5 minutes of prep in the morning each day.

Last year I got my mom to go to the gym with me finally. She's since lost 70 pounds and is in the best shape of her life. I got her to download an app and start counting her calories, and even got her to get a heart rate monitor to maximize her workouts... yet I CAN'T get her to do 5 minutes of preparation for her bodies fuel!

Looking into this... I found that a lot of people will go shopping for their breakfast once a month, chop it all up, prepare it, and place it in small ziplock bags to put in the freezer.

Is there a need, or could there be a desire, for a mass packaged green smoothie? A large bag or box could be purchased which contains daily packages of the perfect mix. The person would simply reach into their freezer, grab a bag, pour it into the blender, add water, and bam, have their healthy morning kick.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[dknise]

It's been beat to death already....Google it.

Do you honestly think I would have made a post without googling it...?

Besides 10,000 books on it, I have not been able to walk into Costco, Safeway, QFC, or any other big retailer and purchase a green smoothie. I've been looking for months.

 

[dknise]

You lost me. Sorry.

How are you still parked? I'm stunned.

:smilielol:

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Is there a need, or could there be a desire, for a mass packaged green smoothie? A large bag or box could be purchased which contains daily packages of the perfect mix. The person would simply reach into their freezer, grab a bag, pour it into the blender, add water, and bam, have their healthy morning kick.

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the idea. Total need. I would buy it. The inconvenience of buying the organic greens, prepping them, and blending them, makes it a pain. If the process could be simplified, you are onto something.

 

[Lauryn]

I think it's a great idea, simply for the fact that:

1. People have excuses as to why they can't get organic ingredients.
2. People have excuses as to why they don't have the time to make the smoothies themselves.
3. Get a great website up - like www.BlueprintCleanse.com (*NO AFFILIATION*) - and marketing and you can get this started ASAP.
4. Once you have a good amount of business online and locally offline, you can then approach major retailers.
5. Yes, we see smoothies in the frozen aisle, but not GREEN smoothies - and an AMAZING GREEN SMOOTHIE is hard to find.

I'm all for it.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Bigguns50]

My 2 cents...I do smoothies with the VitaMix blender..love it !
There ARE a million recipes...all the ones I've seen advertised are oh so pretty..but FULL of sugar..too much fruit. I have some 'green' recipes that taste very good...and lots of green.

There's a marketing concept here...these smoothies are not pretty...they're UGLY ! There ya go..The Ugly Smoothie. Get Ugly to get healthy. Drink some Ugly. Ugly is the new beautiful. A lot of ways to market the Ugliness of a smoothie.

Oh....LEMON....it's takes the bitter out of Kale.

That's all I got.

 

[Thriftypreneur]

Absolutely is a need for these types of drinks in an on-the-go level. Walking into 7-Eleven and grabbing one on the way to the gym would have people buying these up left and right. Not to mention, removing the cost of the juicer, prep, and cleaning makes it a win.

Only problem I can see you running into would be the shelf-life and distribution of the product.

Also, adapt it too much and you're entering territory where you're competing with companies like V8, etc who will kick your a$$ in the competition for shelf space.

 

[dknise]

It's just another smoothie. There is nothing special about it.

You're right, which is why I can't walk into any big retailer and have my pick of 10,000 different fruit smoothies... oh wait I can.

 

[Steele Concept]

I think there is definitely money to be made in this. I watched Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead and promptly purchased a Breville Juicer...

Unfortunately the green drinks taste like shit to me, prolly because I would use so much Kale. After all the Kale and Spinach are by far the healthiest things in that drink. I found out I much prefer eating the things separately and I enjoy the taste of the veggies and fruits by themselves and not all mixed up. I'm kind of a weirdo though I tend to eat the stuff on my plate one at a time and not mix em up. Most people love smoothies.

My ideal breakfast is now a banana, couple handfuls of blueberries. 3-4 eggs (preferably local ones) fried in some coconut oil with some cooked kale on the side.

I saute up Kale in chicken broth with some garlic, onion, pepper, hot red pepper. Delicious!

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[dknise]

Sweet, thanks for the input guys. If you do see this product somewhere... come post it in here! I did a 10 minute search again and found nothing but recipe's and green powders sold by supplement shops.

I emailed 3 local producers this morning and got 1 response back, they said they could definitely make the product. Does anyone know the expected markup to cost on these types of products? I'm thinking the price point would have to be around $2-3 per individual, daily package.

Dude another win in this, I grew up working with my dad's warehousing business. I know the trucking/warehousing/distribution model like the back of my hand haha.

You said in your first post you were "throwing this idea out to this shark tank." Sounds like you were already sold on your idea when you posted that.

I get that, but you didn't provide anything constructive in your comments. Some links to an existing product, or some real criticism other then the negative nancy attitude would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Jonleehacker]

Definitely there is a need. I am an absolute health freak, for example I would never put fruit in my smoothie because it isn't correct food combining and also sugar is sugar, even in fruit, so a lot of fruit is about the same as a chocolate bar (sad but true).

Anyways, the rub would be that the appeal of this type of drink is that it feels healthy and fresh. For me pulling it from the freezer wouldn't cut it and not sure how well some of the ingredients like kale would freeze.

So to really nail this, you would have to have them brought in twice a week, which is a much different distribution problem than monthly.

In general though my head spins with trying to solve this type of problem on a daily basis. In the last week I made two 5,000 mile trips involving several airports. Do you know how much food I can eat that can be found in a typical airport?.... ZERO.

Pretty much the same when I want to go out to a restaurant. I'm a health freak, but still, even Whole Foods is full of foods that make people "feel" like they are eating healthy, but actually do not have much more nutrition that "regular" food.

Big opportunity to deliver healthy food to people in a convenient manner.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[AmyQ]

Your product would be regularly purchased my my household.

We buy two similar things now:

A frozen Acai smoothie packet from Sprouts.
Frozen chopped spinach that we add to smoothies from Trader Joes.

We have to add a bunch of stuff to these and I would prefer your product to either.

We have a vitamix for smoothies and a juicer for green juicing. I always prefer to use the vitamix over the juicer because of time/cleaning. Your product would allow me to do just that....kind of a hybrid between green juicing and a smoothie.

 

[AmyQ]

I was actually just trying to google pre-made green smoothies for purchase. The only thing I came up with was a product called Super Greens- I'm still not sure Super Greens are pills or a liquid beverage... It costs about $75... I am thinking of ordering it online.

I googled some more for something cheaper and saw that Trader Joes has something called Super Green Drink powder for $20.

I think there is a big need for it- because most people need to eat more vegetables but don't... If they had a pre made veggie drink I think more people would be inclined to buy it.

Super Greens tastes horrible! It is a dehydrated veggie powder you add to water.

Also, I think that dknise is thinking about offering a frozen smoothie pack, which is a different product than the dehydrated veggie drink powders like the ones you listed. Not trying to discourage you from trying TJ's, their stuff is usually good.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[dknise]

1) I wouldn't be doing dehydrated powders.
2) I wouldn't be doing pre-made drinks.

I would want to just package and freeze pre-washed, pre-sized quantities for a smoothie to blend. High shelf life and easy packaging. Does that take away from most people's need to not have to clean up? All it would be is a blender.

3) After talking about this so much today now I'm super interested haha... already got producer quotes as well as warehousing and distribution quotes! XD I might just pull the trigger, set it up, and go out to get some purchase orders before making the product.

 

[Era]

Tony Robbins has a green drink product called, Pure Energy Greens. It is in powdered form so I think the pre-packaged packets you mentioned would set it apart from anything that's in the market right now.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[LeungJan]

Although its not exactly the same product..

Somewhat reminds me of soylent, they have the recipe on their site for "make your own" but I'm simply too lazy to gather
all the ingredients and make it myself, would rather purchase theirs.. except they don't have a UK one yet.

Soylent : The Biggest Pivot in YC History
http://blog.soylent.me/

I think you should pull the trigger!

 

[Paul Thomas]

Love the idea. The inconvenience of making/cleaning up the smoothies is what keeps me from making it a regular habit and some other people I know. I would definitely buy it, price considered of course.

EDIT: Just read the above post... definitely eliminate any possible mess and I think you've really got something.

 

[uccash]

I do this as well. I actually looked hard and could not find anything either. I think there is def. a market there, not sure how big though. I just found a local guy who preps them for me weekly, all i have to do it dump the container in a blender and done. It is time consuming, hence why I pay someone else to do it.

Not sure if it would take off for mass market though. Most people don't value their time as people with money do.

 

[brycer9]

Here, some google adwords stats

healthy shake recipes - 5,400 searches/month
how to make healthy smoothies - 3,600 searches/month

It looks like theres definitely a market, and these are only the people who were determined to make the smoothie. With this product, they won't have to

 

[dknise]

My 2 cents...I do smoothies with the VitaMix blender..love it !
There ARE a million recipes...all the ones I've seen advertised are oh so pretty..but FULL of sugar..too much fruit. I have some 'green' recipes that taste very good...and lots of green.

You probably do em right! haha I don't think there's anything wrong with putting in banana, orange, mango, pears, or any other fruits, I would however have a problem with juicing the whole thing!

ps. VitaMix is the way to go!

This is the only one I've seen - I'm sure the nutrition is shit. With the right marketing I think you would have a hit.

General Mills: Yoplait Smoothie

That's the only one I've seen as well, at our local Costco. They also have a frozen mixed berry blend which is used for smoothie's as well. Growing up, every household I knew had them.

 

[dknise]

Wow thanks for all the input guys keep it coming.

Anyways, the rub would be that the appeal of this type of drink is that it feels healthy and fresh. For me pulling it from the freezer wouldn't cut it and not sure how well some of the ingredients like kale would freeze.

I know! Me either! I'd much rather spend 5 minutes to have it mega-fresh... but I've definitely noticed I'm in the minority there.

 

[Steele Concept]

Yo dknise,

This recipe is supposed to be a pretty standard intro to juicing. As Bigguns said lemon can combat the bitterness of Kale.

Green Lemonade Recipe - Allrecipes.com

"Green power"

"Electric green"

"green meal"

"Greenorade" lol

"Nutrigreen" - ooo that one sounds good.

I used to drink a powder called green vibrance. It wasn't bad at all.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[AmyQ]

Thanks Amy-

Do you have any known pre made products that I can purchase at say Whole Foods or some other store?

My husband swears by "Vitamineral Green." It gets good reviews on Amazon also.

 

[AmyQ]

I would want to just package and freeze pre-washed, pre-sized quantities for a smoothie to blend. High shelf life and easy packaging. Does that take away from most people's need to not have to clean up? All it would be is a blender.

No, great for clean up. That is what I thought it was since I buy a (very different) smoothie pack now.

I share your excitement. Hoping you make this product so that I can buy it!

Also, some argue that flash frozen veggies have comparable nutritional value to fresh http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/features/frozen-vegetables-are-hot Not trying to argue that point myself since I don't know enough about nutrition, but it could be good to include on your label.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[DeletedUser2]

Austin-based Daily Juice secures funding to go nationwide - CultureMap Austin

Z

 

[Astral Explorer]

Surely something to look into, on another forum I frequent their was a huge thread about green smoothies...

Most people within the whole paleo and raw diet are big into smoothies, so surely something to look into.

 

[Soulipsyz]

This is the closest thing I could find, I remember seeing this on Dragons Den a while back, although I think your idea has alot more potential if done right:

Dragons’ Den: Why the Cookin’ Greens deal fell through | Financial Post

"Ms. Davidson set about making frozen Kale, collards and rapini sexy in North America. The dark leafy greens are picked fresh and within six hours washed, blanched, chopped and individually quick frozen locking in all the flavour and nutritional benefits. “I was first to market globally for blended leafy greens. The hard part has been educating people,” she says. “Sales haven’t been hitting the targets."

See where she went wrong and do better!

 

[dknise]

This is the closest thing I could find, I remember seeing this on Dragons Den a while back, although I think your idea has alot more potential if done right:

Dragons’ Den: Why the Cookin’ Greens deal fell through | Financial Post

"Ms. Davidson set about making frozen Kale, collards and rapini sexy in North America. The dark leafy greens are picked fresh and within six hours washed, blanched, chopped and individually quick frozen locking in all the flavour and nutritional benefits. “I was first to market globally for blended leafy greens. The hard part has been educating people,” she says. “Sales haven’t been hitting the targets."

See where she went wrong and do better!

That's pretty much EXACTLY what I was talking about, specifically packaged together for daily use.

I'm definitely going to be looking into it...

 

[Mouse McCoy]

From my botanical knowledge and experience: once picked the plant begins to wither and die, this process can be significantly slowed by flash freezing.

The plant material begins to die much quicker once the cell walls have been broken by blending/mixing, obviously. The more you process it; (store it, reconstitute it) you lose nutrition at every turn. Flash freezing at the point of picking when it's already in "smoothie form" or in raw materials in the correct proportions bundled together and frozen in a bag would be the most healthy, in my experience.

Try to process it as little as possible, is my advice.

 

[CommonCents]

One big reason why there aren't more fresh commercial smoothie/juice products is liability. You are dealing w/ fresh produce in a product with no kill step(generally getting product to 165deg to kill pathogens). Freezing is not a kill step. The Naked brand smoothies (getting flack for a number of reasons) are flash pasteurized as most other 'fresh' juice products are. Fresh produce in grocery stores are not generally tested for pathogens(ecoli, listeria, salmonella, etc...). The regulatory agencies wait for enough people to get sick or die before investigating. So WASH your produce thoroughly! Especially for the sick, the young, and elderly who may have compromised immune systems.

I had a food mfg company and this was always on our minds and we went to great lengths to mitigate this risk (HACCP programs etc..) One incident can possibly put you out of biz overnight.

Not to scare anyone from this opportunity, but rather do your homework and do what you can to mitigate risk upfront.