Business was humming along nicely for Phoenixville kombucha company Baba’s Brew, with its products on the shelves of major retailers like Whole Foods Market. Then the Covid-19 pandemic hit. The shutdowns and consumer stockpiling of essential goods meant owner Olga Sorzano’s grocery-heavy business was slashed some 70% in the immediate aftermath.
While business has since rebounded, in the initial wake of dropping sales, Sorzano sought to launch another product that was shelf-stable and had a longer shelf life. The result was her new line of kombucha vinegars, dubbed Acid Trip, which launched in November. In time she hopes it will make up about 15% of business.
The goal behind Acid Trip was product diversification. While widespread shutdowns like the ones experienced in 2020 may not be on the horizon, after seven years in business, product innovation felt like the right step.
Fittingly, the line was born out of Baba’s Brew’s signature kombuchas. “Acid Trip starts where our Baba's Brew ends,” Sorzano said.
Kombucha is made by brewing tea and then adding cultures to it. After, the beverage ferments for up to six weeks, giving it the effervescence for which the drink is known. Sorzano adds berries, herbs and spices to her blends to concoct her roughly half-dozen flavors.
During the early days of the pandemic, distributors weren’t shipping Baba’s Brew as frequently. Rather than discard one batch that sat longer, Sorzano let it continue fermenting. Upon tasting it, she was surprised at the flavor, which she described as a “really bright, vibrant vinegar.”
That wasn’t her first time dabbling with a kombucha vinegar, having used them when cooking at home. But the idea to scale it commercially hadn’t occurred to her before. Its shelf-stable nature – kombucha vinegar is good for about two years, compared with about four months for kombucha, which has to be refrigerated – gave her business more stability.
Acid Trip ferments for about six months and undergoes a second fermentation, in which flavors like fresh fruit and spices are added. The vinegars are available in four flavors: pear ginger, raspberry lime, grapefruit, and cayenne.
“I just thought it was a really, really great pivot turning your existing product into something that has much longer shelf life and even much wider application,” she said.
Those applications include cocktails and mocktails, in addition to dishes. Acid Trip has about 3% acidity – lower than the 5% to 7% in traditional vinegars – and is infused with fruits and spices, which Sorzano said makes it a nice complement to drinks.
For example, the raspberry lime vinegar can be used to make what Sorzano has dubbed a pink gimlet or a berry mojito, while the cayenne can be used in a chili margarita.
Its use in mocktails is something she’s hoping gives the brand a boost when it launches with Lancaster Farm Fresh Co-op for distribution come January, a month when many choose to eschew alcohol.
“These vinegars, they're bright, they're refreshing,” Sorzano said.
They come in 12-ounce bottles and retail for $12.99 each.
Sorzano is no stranger to the wholesale business, with Baba’s Brew in the likes of Whole Foods throughout the Mid-Atlantic, Giant Heirloom and Mom’s Organic Market, among others, working with several distributors including Lancaster Farm Fresh.
In total, Baba’s Brew can be found in about 450 stores.
In addition to launching the vinegar, Sorzano has already begun working on another product, a functional kombucha. She hopes to launch that in the coming months. Unlike her traditional brew, she anticipates the as yet unnamed beverage to come in a can and contain adaptogens, which are believed to help the body’s stress functions as well as focus.
Baba’s Brew, Acid Trip and the forthcoming functional kombucha build on Sorzano’s 25 years in the restaurant industry and harken back to her childhood. Born and raised in southern Siberia in Russia, fermenting foods to preserve them for the long winters was the norm. Her great-grandmother – who the brand is named for – brewed her own kombucha.
When Sorzano came to the U.S. as part of an exchange program during her doctoral program in veterinary medicine over 20 years ago, she couldn’t find kombucha or fermented foods like at home. Assigned to a small dairy farm in Nebraska, she eventually met her husband, who landed a job in Greater Philadelphia, where the couple relocated and have remained since.
Despite her background in veterinary medicine, Sorzano’s calling was in the culinary arts. Upon arriving in Philadelphia, she attended the Restaurant School at Walnut Hill College, even doing a short internship at the since shuttered French standout Le Bec Fin.
Sorzano became a private chef and later opened her catering company, Lost Gourmet. But she was still looking for something else and inspiration struck when she and her husband took a trip to Santa Barbara, California, in late 2014. At the time, a fermentation festival was taking place.
“I was transported to my childhood,” Sorzano said.
That trip proved inspiration for what would become Baba’s Brew. Despite kombucha not yet being mainstream, she and her husband were confident such a business could succeed and have self-funded the venture from day one.
“I would prefer to be ahead of the wave than behind,” she said.
In 2015, Baba’s Brew was officially formed. In 2017, they moved to their current brewery at 333 Morgan St. in Phoenixville, where they also operate a tasting room known as A Culture Factory. In total, Baba’s Brew produces about 250,000 bottles and 2,500 kegs of kombucha per year.
