When David Lester pivoted to entrepreneurship after nearly a decade at alcohol giant Diageo, he took with him one key principle for successful innovation: “Break one rule, break it really hard, and then keep everything else the same.”
That tenet has guided Lester and his business partner Ben Goodwin through the co-founding and brand-building of prebiotic soda juggernaut Olipop. Since its founding in 2018, Olipop has contributed to the growth of the digestive health beverage category—a segment that was valued at $26 billion in 2022 and is projected to nearly double by 2032, according to Future Market Insights. In just five years, Lester and Goodwin have developed Olipop from a product that many investors refused to buy into (“Healthy soda? No one’s going to buy that”) to a brand set to exceed $200 million in revenue by the end of 2023, according to figures shared by the brand.
Lester helms Olipop’s marketing and sales strategies, which together have propelled the brand to become not only the fastest-growing functional beverage brand but a healthier challenger to soda giants such as Coca-Cola and Pepsi. In fact, his marketing approach has largely emulated those of Olipop’s rivals, honing in on embedding the brand into key pop culture moments. In May, for example, the company featured Grammy-nominated singer and Olipop investor Camila Cabello in its first major advertising campaign, “Real Love Makes Us.”
