What changed
Jetty, an everyday hydration brand: ready to drink 15.2 ounce bottles at $2.49 and 15 gram electrolyte powder packets in five flavors (watermelon, orange mango, fruit punch, black raspberry, white cherry); per serving about 100 mg sodium, 310 mg potassium, 100 mg magnesium, B vitamins, prebiotics, 6 g sugar, 45 calories
When
On sale from Monday, November 9, 2026; reported by CNBC on November 8 and by Modern Retail and Food Dive on November 9, 2026
Who it affects
Allison Ellsworth (co-founder and chief brand officer) and Stephen Ellsworth (co-founder and CEO), the founders of Poppi, which PepsiCo bought in 2025; sold at Whole Foods Market, Target.com and Amazon
What to do
Beverage and supplement brands: map your own launch across Amazon, a mass retailer's site and one specialty grocer at the same time, price the entry SKU under $3, and build repeat through Subscribe & Save before you buy traffic

Key takeaways

  • Jetty launched November 9, 2026 at Whole Foods, Target.com and Amazon with $2.49 bottles and powder packets in five flavors, self funded with $2.5 million by the Poppi founders.
  • The category is growing 20% a year to $2.6 billion while sports drink units fell 9.1% since 2022, and Gatorade still holds about 60% of the aisle (SPINS and Numerator data via CNBC).
  • For sellers the lesson is in the format and the channel plan: light powders carry the ads, bottles carry the shelf, and repeat through Subscribe & Save pays back a launch sold at break even.

From Poppi to Jetty

  1. PepsiCo closes the $1.95B Poppi deal with up to $300M in earnouts

  2. PepsiCo filing values the earnout at $12M

  3. CNBC reports Jetty, self funded with $2.5M

  4. Jetty on sale at Whole Foods, Target.com and Amazon

  5. Founders plan to raise outside capital

What Jetty launched and where

Jetty sells two formats. The ready to drink bottle holds 15.2 ounces and retails for $2.49, the price Modern Retail reported from the brand. The powder comes as a 15 gram packet to mix into water. Both carry the same five flavors at launch: watermelon, orange mango, fruit punch, black raspberry and white cherry, per CNBC and Food Dive. CNBC said a lemon lime version, the original Gatorade flavor, is planned but not yet ready.

The formula is the pitch. Each serving carries about 100 mg of sodium, 310 mg of potassium and 100 mg of magnesium plus B vitamins and prebiotics, with 6 grams of sugar and 45 calories a bottle, according to Food Dive and CNBC. Modern Retail put the sodium at under 100 mg. The founders say there are no artificial sweeteners or dyes. CNBC compared that with a 20 ounce Gatorade Thirst Quencher at about 270 mg sodium, 80 mg potassium and 34 grams of sugar.

Distribution on day one is Whole Foods Market stores nationwide, Target.com and Amazon, all three outlets agree. Allison Ellsworth takes the chief brand officer role and Stephen Ellsworth is CEO, CNBC reported. The brand is funded with $2.5 million of the couple's own money, and CNBC said they expect to raise outside capital in 2027 from people who can write about $1 million checks and bring celebrity access, rather than a venture fund writing $15 million.

Per serving, as reported by CNBC and Food Dive

Jetty bottleGatorade 20 oz
Size15.2 oz20 oz
Sodiumabout 100 mgabout 270 mg
Potassium310 mg80 mg
Sugar6 g34 g
Price$2.49Varies by retailer

The Poppi backstory, and the earnout that shrank

The founders' track record is the reason retailers listed Jetty before it had a single sale. Poppi, their prebiotic soda, was sold to PepsiCo for $1.95 billion in 2025 with up to $300 million more if it hit targets by the third quarter of 2027, CNBC reported. PepsiCo's October 2026 filing put the fair value of that potential payment at $12 million, a point we covered in our Poppi earnout report. The Ellsworths declined to comment on the filing to CNBC.

Two more Poppi lessons shape Jetty. Poppi paid $8.9 million to settle a class action over its gut health claims, so CNBC reported that Jetty's packaging carries three claims that lawyers signed off on before launch. And the brand is reusing Poppi's playbook of influencer gifting and a founder led video series, Modern Retail reported, including a planned YouTube show. Allison Ellsworth told Modern Retail, "No one is excited to see me win again."

The category numbers behind the bet

Jetty is entering a market that is growing while its biggest product shrinks. Hydration and electrolyte dollar sales rose 20% to $2.6 billion in the 52 weeks ended October 4, 2026, according to SPINS data cited by CNBC. Over the same period the traditional sports drink aisle has been losing volume: unit sales fell 9.1% between 2022 and 2026, per Numerator data in the same report. Gatorade still holds about 60% of the US sports drink category, CNBC said, citing Numerator; Modern Retail quoted a 61.1% figure from a 2025 trade report.

The money has been moving to powders and to new entrants. CNBC noted that single serve electrolyte mixes are growing faster than ready to drink thanks to Unilever's Liquid I.V. and smaller brands such as LMNT, that Kraft Heinz launched Capri Sun and Kool-Aid electrolyte products this spring, and that Keurig Dr Pepper's distributed brand Electrolit posted 40% retail sales growth in the third quarter. Allison Ellsworth told CNBC that electrolyte powders are a $1 billion category on Amazon alone. The warning sign is also in the record: Coca-Cola wrote down BodyArmor by more than $1.7 billion after paying $5.6 billion for control in late 2021.

A GLP-1 angle sits underneath. Ellsworth told CNBC and Modern Retail she lost 60 pounds on a GLP-1 medication and found she was not drinking enough; the drugs can reduce thirst. CNBC cited an EY-Parthenon survey of more than 3,600 current or former GLP-1 users in which about 44% said they now drink more functional beverages.

So what: the math of a $2.49 bottle on Amazon

A single $2.49 bottle cannot be shipped profitably by anyone, so the Amazon play is the multipack and the powder. For example (illustrative numbers, not Jetty's), take a 12 bottle case listed at $29.99. The 15% referral fee takes $4.50. A case of liquid weighing around 12 pounds lands in a large standard FBA tier where the fulfillment fee runs several dollars; call it $7.50. If the product costs $9.00 to make and pack, the brand is left with about $8.99 before advertising. At an illustrative $1.20 cost per click and a 10% conversion rate, each paid order costs $12.00 in ads, more than the whole margin.

That is why the first order is a loss leader and the brand lives or dies on repeat. If the same case moves to Subscribe & Save with a 5% brand funded discount ($1.50) and no ad cost, the second and later orders keep roughly $7.49 each. Three repeat orders recover the launch loss. The powder packets flip the math: a 15 gram sachet is light, so a 20 count box at a similar price carries a far lower fulfillment fee and a bigger cushion for ads. Expect Jetty's Amazon ad budget to lean on the powder and its retail shelf to lean on the bottle.

What this launch gets right for retailers and the marketplace

Three channels on one day is the pattern worth noting. A specialty grocer (Whole Foods) gives trial and photos for social. A mass retailer's website (Target.com) gives a national price anchor without the slotting risk of a full store rollout. Amazon gives the search demand, the reviews and the subscription engine. The sequence many brands use, Amazon first and retail two years later, is reversed here because the founders already have the buyer relationships; a first time brand should still prove velocity on Amazon before pitching the grocer, as we lay out in our product launch guide.

The 45 calorie, 6 gram sugar formula is also a positioning move against two different competitors at once: it undercuts Gatorade on sugar and undercuts zero sugar powders on taste and fiber. The risk is the same one Poppi hit, which is health claims. Any brand copying this should have every front of pack claim reviewed before the listing goes live, because Amazon suppresses supplement style claims quickly and the FTC has been active on them.

What beverage and supplement brands should do this week

Five steps, each with an owner, a place and a metric.

  • Brand manager: list Jetty's five ASINs and Gatorade's top three in Brand Analytics and watch the Search Query Performance report for 'hydration powder' and 'electrolyte drink' over the next four weeks. Metric: your share of clicks on those queries.
  • Finance: rebuild unit economics for your lightest SKU as a Subscribe & Save hero, assuming the first order is sold at break even. Metric: contribution margin on the third repeat order.
  • Growth lead: open the Amazon ad console and add Jetty's ASINs as product targets in one Sponsored Products campaign with a bid 20% below your category average, since launch listings have few reviews. Metric: ACoS on that campaign versus your account average.
  • Merchandising: build a multipack or powder box priced between $25 and $35 so the fulfillment fee is under a quarter of the price. Metric: fee as a percentage of sale price in the FBA revenue calculator.
  • Compliance: send every health claim on your front panel to counsel before Q1, including 'hydration' and 'gut' language. Metric: zero listing suppressions in Account Health over the quarter.
  • Leadership: if you have an exit behind you or a founder with an audience, plan the retail and marketplace launch on the same day the way Jetty did, and book the audit of your Amazon account first through our free Amazon audit so the listing is ready for the traffic spike.
  1. 1Track the ASINs

    Jetty and Gatorade in Brand Analytics, four weeks

  2. 2Rebuild the math

    Lightest SKU as a Subscribe & Save hero

  3. 3Target the launch

    Product targeting at 20% below category bid

  4. 4Fix the pack

    Multipack priced $25 to $35

  5. 5Clear the claims

    Counsel reviews every front panel claim

When this does not apply

If you sell a heavy ready to drink product with no powder or concentrate format, the Amazon math above does not improve with repeat alone; the fulfillment fee stays too high, and your channel should be retail and your own site. If your category is not growing 20% a year, a self funded launch across three channels is a cash drain, not a moat. And if you do not have a founder with an audience, the influencer gifting and YouTube series will not produce the launch week volume Jetty expects; buy the data first and the content second. For brands that want help running Amazon ads through a launch, see our Amazon PPC management service, and for more launches like this follow ecommerce marketplace news.

Sources

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