The Juicero controversy this week left a bad taste in a lot of people鈥檚 mouths.
Juicero billed itself as a top-of-the-line juicing machine with a top-of-the-line price point 鈥� $400, down from the original $700 鈥� warranted by the unique design and process by which the machine did its thing.
However, Juicero has a problem: extracting juice from the packets is as easy as giving the pouch a firm hand squeeze鈥攏o $400 squasher needed.
In light of reviews by and others, it began to seem that the pricey at-home juice press is little more than a glorified Capri Sun squeezer for the Whole Foods crowd.
While its product is perhaps unique in the normal Silicon Valley milieu, Juicero appears painfully similar to many ambitious venture-backed companies, down to soaring rhetoric, near-mythic origin story of its founder, huge sums of venture capital raised, and a PR disaster to call its own.
That the company鈥檚 initial userbase (to our knowledge: mostly venture capitalists, fancy-pants creative studios, and yuppies who go on and on about that one time they, like, totally found enlightenment at Burning Man)聽was instantly risible did not help.
Notably, none of this would have caused such a fuss if Juicero didn鈥檛 also happen to be the most-funded hardware startup of 2016. The company raised聽 in venture financing from the likes of Kleiner Perkins, GV, and over a dozen other investors since its inception.
Let鈥檚 take a look at the fourteen other companies in the nutrition, food processing, cooking, and food and beverage categories into which Juicero鈥檚 investors have also deployed capital.
Other Food Companies Juicero鈥檚 Investors Have Invested In
With the exception of the Campbell Soup Company, First Beverage Group, and Acre Venture Partners, none of Juicero鈥檚 13 other investors listed in 兔子先生传媒 specialize in the food and beverage industry. Despite that fact,聽Juicero鈥檚 investors have racked up exposure to a wide array of companies in the category.
GV (formerly known as Google Ventures) has a fairly diverse portfolio that includes several companies connected to the food and beverage space. The firm participated in food analytics and molecular food standardization company 鈥檚 Series B round. In a similar space, GV also invested in Seed round. The venture firm was also an investor in the Series A and Series B rounds of , the high-end coffee chain. However, GV鈥檚 biggest moonshot investment in the food industry may well be in the Series C round of , which manufactures plant-based animal protein substitutes that tastes remarkably like meat.
Thrive Capital, another one of Juicero鈥檚 investors, has committed capital to a couple of companies in the food space, mostly on the delivery and meal kit side of the industry. Thrive was involved in the Seed round of high-end food delivery startup , and it participated in one of 鈥檚 venture rounds.
Other food-related investments made by Juicero鈥檚 investors include:
- Kleiner Perkins invested in 鈥檚 Series E round.
- Aspiration Growth invested in meal-kit delivery service 鈥檚 Series D round.
- First Beverage Group invested in alcohol delivery company 鈥檚 Series A round.
- The Campbell Soup Company invested in , a nutrition tracking and digital coaching app. The company is the only recorded investor in $32 million venture round.
- Vast Ventures invested in Washington, DC-based fast casual chain 鈥檚 venture round.
- Melo7 Tech Partners invested in the Seed round of , a restaurant discovery app.
Although there are plenty of companies in the food and nutrition space that have squeezed capital out of Juicero鈥檚 investors in the past, the juice company鈥檚 investor syndicate has relatively little exposure to comparable companies in the beverage space.
Investments In Beverage Companies From Juicero’s Investors
Two beverage companies have also received funding from some of Juicero鈥檚 investors. , makers of dairy-free alternatives to milk using ingredients derived from peas and other plant-based sources, raised money from GV, which led the company鈥檚 $30 million Series B round.
What might be the only other investment that combines physical products and the food and beverage industry is , in which Vast Ventures invested in its Seed and Series A rounds. That said, Soma鈥檚 premium line of minimal water filters and various containers ranging from pitchers to water bottles is a far cry from the complexity of what Juicero is trying to build.
Although Juicero聽will likely weather this PR storm, skepticism will persist. All the king鈥檚 horses and all the king鈥檚 men can鈥檛 put a company back together again, especially if it wasn鈥檛 quite together to begin with.
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