A Spindrift Q&A with Jon from our Innovation Team

At Spindrift, we go to great lengths to source the best-tasting fruit from the farms and we’ve spent years honing our manufacturing process to honor the fruit. We ensure every batch meets high standards of quality, and we never stop there. Innovation is a huge part of our culture, our business, and our products. “Proudly made the hard way” means we’re always looking ahead, aiming higher or further, finding new challenges to undertake and new products or flavors to put our spin on.  

To learn more about our approach to Innovation and R&D, we sat down with Jon, SVP of Innovation & Business Development. 

Hi Jon! Tell us what you do at Spindrift.

I create our road map for new products, categories and suppliers.

What's the most interesting or most unexpected part of your job? 

Spending some time with farmers & their fruit. 

In your role, who is the hero and who is the villain? 

Farmers are the hero: they contend with mother nature to produce the delicious fruit that ends up in every can of Spindrift.

The villain is probably the widespread use of sweeteners, fake flavors, and products without real ingredients that has influenced consumers' tastes. But that's why we do what we do at Spindrift. We want to reintroduce the amazing flavor of real fruit to the American palate - real ingredients should be accessible to all.

What weird acronym or lingo do you say and what does it mean? 

“long pole in the tent” that’s the part of the development process that takes the longest and is the one we need to keep an eye on.

What's a challenging part of your job? 

Balancing the expectations people have of what a drink should be and how it should taste - while sticking to our mission of using only what nature gives us (fruit).  

In your area of expertise, what does Spindrift do that's different than others? 

When Spindrift makes a product, it is as different as a beverage can be. It is juice, drums of juice, totes of juice. Juice has to be kept cold, stirred, tasted and then prepared for batches, mixed, etc. It never just sits in a warehouse. Our manufacturing process is night and day...and then some! 

What's something you had to learn “the hard way”? 

Spindrift uses what nature gives us…juices & purees that we pick and process at their peak of freshness. That isn't something that you can set your clock to every harvest. Yields can be up or down, crops come in early or late. We have spent thousands of hours over many years working to make sure that what goes in a can of Spindrift is the best tasting product consumers can buy.

What 3 things are always in your fridge? 

Sriracha, chicken stock, Spindrift

What flavor are you sipping on repeat right now? 

Grapeade & Pink Lemonade.

What is your favorite Spindrift pairing?

BOT over ice after a long run.

Any fun facts or interesting info you'd like consumers to know?

About me...no. But....a deck of cards, when well-shuffled, has never ended up in the exact same sequence as any other deck of shuffled cards in the history of the human race!! Crazy, right? 

Thanks, Jon!

To learn more about how Spindrift is proudly made the hard way, check out our other interviews with teammates and watch our brand film to see what originally inspired Bill to start Spindrift and how that ethos keeps us going today.