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The Natural List – Best beverage innovations from Newtopia Now 2025The Natural List – Best beverage innovations from Newtopia Now 2025
Listen now to explore which beverage innovations are reshaping consumer expectations and creating new opportunities in the natural products industry.
25 Min View
At a Glance
- Broth is back: Is it a food or a beverage? Mushroom broths and caffeinated sipping broths create an entirely new category.
- Which natural sweeteners are winning with consumers? Our hosts break down stevia, dates, monkfruit and more.
- Brands deliver wellness benefits through unexpected formats and formulas like fiber water and adaptogenic mushroom sodas.
We’re buzzing over the beverage innovations from Newtopia Now! On this week’s episode of The Natural List, our hosts Jessica Rubino and Adrienne Smith discuss which beverage trends surprised and delighted our team onsite.
The show floor showcased a decisive shift toward nutrient-dense functional beverages that transcend traditional categories, from savory energy drinks and sports-focused bone broth sticks to milder probiotic options like water kefir. Functional mushrooms were still holding strong, showing up as a standout ingredient across multiple formats like sodas and broths. Wellness-focused beverages with supplement-like properties gained momentum through targeted herbal blends and adaptogenic formulations, while innovations like fiber water illustrated how brands are delivering functional benefits in convenient, appealing packages that balance health advantages with sensory appeal.
Listen now for an overview of beverage innovations our team was delighted by on the show floor.
In this episode:
1:15 Newtopia Now reflections, takeaways and industry insights
3:15 Beverages galore! Overview of category expansion
3:43 Innovation in broth - unexpected but exciting!
7:25 Hydration innovation beyond water
12:30 Nutrient-density reigns supreme
13:51 Wellness ritual beverages
16:10 Australian Beneficial with sticky chai
17:15 Innovative functional beverage formats
19:53 The new cola?
21:50 The battle of the sweeteners
23:27 Host's favorites from the show
24:35 SPINS Retailer Choice Award winner
Stay tuned to the end, when our hosts share their personal favorite drinks from the show floor and identify which brand won the SPINS Retailer Choice Award.
Enjoy our vodcast here or on YouTube. Prefer to tune in via podcast? Join us on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
Your hosts
About Jessica Rubino
Jessica Rubino is a natural products industry expert and content strategist with more than 15 years experience in media, events and natural products. As New Hope Network’s vice president of content, Jessica oversees digital and print content, conference programming and branded content for CPGs, retailers, investors and service providers. Jessica is passionate about using innovation as a force for good and leveraging content to spark the changes we want to see in the world.
About Adrienne Smith
Adrienne Smith is the director of content for newhope.com and the editor-in-chief of Natural Foods Merchandiser magazine where she helps ideate and produce content for natural products retailers, brands and entrepreneurs. She also runs the NEXTY Awards, an annual program held in conjunction with Natural Products Expo West that recognizes emerging and established natural CPG brands for their innovation, inspiration and integrity. A former restaurant owner, chef and sommelier, Adrienne is passionate about food in all its forms.
About the Author
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