With a focus on Greater Philadelphia small product-based businesses and entrepreneurs, "The Creators" is a weekly feature presented as a part of PHL Inno. Check back each Monday for a new profile on a local business. Have a story you think we should know about? Email associate editor Lisa Dukart at ldukart@bizjournals.com.
When Laura Taylor decided to stop drinking alcohol, she felt she was missing something in social interactions.
At gatherings, she tried others drinks like diet soda or seltzer, neither of which she really enjoyed.
The feeling of missing something came into sharp perspective when in a show of support, a friend made her a lemonade bar for a holiday celebration. Though Taylor appreciated the gesture, “I [felt] like a little kid at the kids’ table,” she recalled.
That was her first inkling that there was a hole in an industry she didn't yet know anything about.
The next came ahead of a girls’ trip to the Pocono Mountains, when Taylor decided to look for something different, this time coming across mocktails. When the one she ordered wouldn’t arrive in time, she made her own. Already into juicing, making a mocktail didn’t seem too big of a leap. In her Main Line kitchen, Taylor whipped up a drink reminiscent of a cranberry cosmopolitan, minus the alcohol, packing it for the getaway.
Then came the moment of truth. Surrounded by her friends the first afternoon of their trip, as “corks started popping,” Taylor uncapped her concoction and poured a glass. “And that's when I had this beautiful aha moment, that wow, this feels good,” she recalled. “What I felt was that social connection I had missed for so long and it just felt great.”
Shortly after returning home, Taylor began researching mocktails. Around the same time, the one she’d ordered arrived. “It tasted like a juice box,” she recalled. Put off by its sugary contents, Taylor began looking into the industry to see if there was a place for a better – and healthier – mocktail.
That was in spring 2017. In the nearly five years since she first conceptualized what would become Mingle Mocktails, the Wayne-based brand has grown tremendously and can be found nationwide.
Despite its success today, the journey took time.
An executive in the software industry – at the time she was working for Tableau Software in global systems, and had previously held roles at IBM and Accenture – five years ago Taylor quietly put together a business plan before testing her ideas on a small, trusted group. Receiving positive feedback, the last person she spoke to asked why Taylor hadn’t sought an investment from him.
Eventually she did, but first she had a few things to get in order. Connecting with an incubator in New York, Taylor dug into supply chain and co-packing. Working with formulators, they created the brand’s signature flavors, one of which was based on the recipe she concocted for her Poconos getaway. The line today totals five options – the original Cranberry Cosmo plus Blackberry Hibiscus Bellini, Cucumber Melon Mojito, Blood Orange Elderflower Mimosa, and a Moscow Mule.
Taylor likens her approach to mocktails to plant-based foods. “If you look at how Impossible [Foods] and Beyond [Meat], those two, how they just changed the landscape of plant-based foods, I think it was a natural progression that people who don't drink or are taking a break would demand something other than seltzer or soda to replace that experience with something better for you,” she said, also pointing to the surge in dairy alternatives.
It was also important that the drinks not too closely replicate their alcoholic counterparts “because I feel that a lot of people that do give up drinking, if they have something that tastes like it, they're just one drink away from going back to the real thing,” Taylor said.
While the mocktail can be consumed as is, Taylor recognizes that some will add an alcoholic component.
Mingle Mocktails is now sold in more than 1,500 stores in the U.S., as well as in Italy, Spain and Trinidad. Taylor estimates the brand is closing in on sales in all 50 states, plus Puerto Rico, and is available in select outposts of retail giants like Whole Foods Market, Wegmans, and Acme.
Taylor took Mingle Mocktails on full-time in 2019, the same year she was part of the Tory Burch Foundation Fellows Program. Open to women entrepreneurs, Taylor had been interested in applying previously but hadn't yet met the revenue threshold criteria, which today is $75,000.
Prior to the pandemic, Mingle were served in a few restaurants, including Fleming’s Steakhouse in Radnor, and country clubs. Returning to those venues is a goal moving forward, as is expanding the brand's retail presence. Taylor is also eyeing larger venues like Citizens Bank Park.
Increasing e-commerce is a big part of her game plan, especially on Amazon. Mingle is no stranger to e-commerce, having a presence on QVC’s online platform after Taylor appeared on the shopping network several times in previous years.
Sales are consistent throughout the year, Taylor said, but Mingle sees spikes around the holidays and the beginning of the year when many Americans participate in Dry January, the practice of abstaining from alcohol for the month.
Originally available in bottles, in mid-2021 Mingle Mocktails began offering a number of its drinks in single-serve cans. The drinks range in price from $13.95 for a single bottle and $19.95 for a four-pack of cans up to $62.95 for 16 cans.
Taylor has tapped into a growing trend with mocktails. Fewer Americans today imbibe – about 40% of U.S. adults according to Gallup data released in August 2021, putting “current alcohol consumption on the low end of the range Gallup has recorded over the past two decades.”
With that shift, non-alcoholic beverage sales are poised for explosive growth. A July 2021 report from Research and Markets found that the global industry – valued at $927.5 billion in 2020 – will swell to an estimated $1.28 trillion by 2026.
To further capitalize, Taylor said she’s looking to infuse the business with fresh funding and will seek an investment in the “seven-figure range” in the near future, predominately from friends and family, she said. That’s who she tapped when initially launching Mingle, taking in an undisclosed sum.
“I'm seeking investors to help me grow. That's a priority right now, actually, because one thing I need to do is hire more salespeople,” she said.
Taylor even pitched Mingle Mocktails to a group of Philadelphia-area investors for the second season of locally produced show “The Wolf PAC,” which is expected to air later this year. “I can't speak of the outcome, but it was a great experience,” she said.
While Taylor is focused on expansion, she also has her eye on long-term strategy, which may include acquisition. “I look at a company like Molson Coors knowing that they have a whole lot behind them, but they've got a portfolio of brands and I would like them to eventually potentially acquire Mingle,” she said.
For now, Taylor is focused on getting the brand into as many spaces as possible. “I want to see Mingle sold and served wherever alcohol is sold and served so everyone feels part of the party. That's like my mission, hard stop.”
What led you to give up alcohol?
My background was in business. At the time, I had a global role, doing a lot of travels, a lot of responsibilities and also had two kids. … I found that turning to a couple glasses of wine was fine, but I found myself turning to it more and more as a way to defuse stress, kind of mentally check out and quiet the noise of the pressures I put on myself and that were out there. I found that between being in this lovely neighborhood that has a lot of happy hours and barbecues, and the work environment where there were a lot of business dinners and cocktail receptions, I was drinking too much and I had to call myself out on it. And I knew that it was a problem so I quit.
Where did the name come from?
I had a list of probably 125 names. … I was just coming up with all these words, but mingle really hit me. And I thought, this captures the essence of the brand where I want it to be social and fun, and not serious and exclusive.
How do you differentiate Mingle from other brands on the market?
I have a unique point of view as a founder who has given up alcohol to speak to it because a lot of those big brands it's just another brand to make money and I really have a core mission to enable everyone to feel part of the party. So I think that's having that guttural, in your blood, want-to-make-this-happen mission. I think the last thing is the fact that we accept and acknowledge that we're flexibly mixable, to reinforce that social connection. With the term “mingle” it's easy to convey that and say this is for people who choose not to booze, but certainly feel free to add your favorite spirit.
