Export success of World’s smartest drink – Ārepa
Jan 26

Export success of World’s smartest drink – Ārepa

We’ve long heard of the concept of ‘brain food’ but a clever company right here in New Zealand has taken the concept and bottled it, with a science-backed, caffeine free, 100% natural brain health and performance food.

Launched in New Zealand in 2017, Ārepa Nootropics has big plans and is well on its way thanks, to a large extent, to the expertise of The FoodBowl.

“We’re a brainfood technology company with a mission to make brains work better and delay the onset of neurological decline worldwide through accessible and scalable brain food,” Co-Founder / CEO Angus Brown says.

“Every year we can push out neurological decline, we can save the world up to $500bn in economic burden. Our goal is to grow a billion-dollar brain food export business out of New Zealand.”

The FoodBowl enabled the company to test out a novel non-thermal, high-pressure process to extend the shelf life of their first drink, working together for the first two years before Ārepa moved to a larger-scale facility. In 2020, they paired up again to prototype a 90ml shot product and successfully launch this into the market online and through BP and New World.

Angus says being thrown onto the forefront of the food-technology business, not only in New Zealand but also internationally, and getting to work with hundreds of companies big and small gave him a great understanding of the key things required to be successful in this game and he counts learning how to protect his IP and scale up a new idea as being powerful drawcards to The FoodBowl.

Revenue has doubled year on year since launch and they’re exporting to major customers in Australia such as Coles. Nine clinical studies have investigated the effects against the likes of dementia and ADHD, with one paper already published and they’ve locked in three patents in various export markets.

“Ārepa is now the highest value, fastest selling health drink in New Zealand supermarkets!”