Behind the Brand: Ūmmi Kombucha

In a short amount of time, Ūmmi Kombucha have created a hype for the consumer that wants a healthier alternative to the traditional post shred beer, a product that, on the one hand, is alcoholic but also organic, vegan and gluten-free. Ūmmi has been quick to sign up an all-star team of ambassadors who are uniquely co-owners, with Arthur Longo, Kevin Backstrom, Tor Lundstrom, Lucas Puig, Ben Howard, Oski, and more promoting the brand. The products have been flying off the shelves, and the company is growing fast. We spoke to one of the founders, Jonathan Weaver, to find out more.

Interview by Tom Kingsnorth

Firstly, for those that don’t know, what is Ūmmi Kombucha?
Hey, thanks for the question. Ūmmi Kombucha is an organic, vegan, gluten-free alcoholic kombucha, brewed using tea from the only remaining tea farm in Europe, based in the Azores, Portugal.

What made you decide to add alcohol instead of creating a non-alcoholic version?
We did discuss that, but it felt like the bigger opportunity to start with was hard kombucha because we’d be essentially first to market one. We might create a non-alcohol version in the coming months, but for now, we’re focused on building out the space we are creating in Europe.

What was the process like from conception of the brand to delivering the final product?
It started in Autumn 2019 on a trip to Europe and meeting up with Greg Martin, Chris Hotell, Tiago, Laura, Marlon and then deciding to start working on it. We launched in Portugal in June 2021, and so yes, it’s been a solid 18 months of building to that point.

Ūmmi in Hibiscus Berry flavour

It must be a tough time to start any business, especially when so many restaurants have been forced to close due to covid. What problems have you encountered?
Yes, exactly, so we had 2 or 3 breweries close on us who we were going to work with, so it’s been quite challenging to find that partner. Then this summer, when we felt we were ready to launch, Portugal got hit with Covid and ended up being on countries red lists, so tourism was a bit lower than expected. That said, it’s been a great opportunity to connect to the local community even closer through a few events, bar staff training and even hand delivery boxes of Ūmmi ourselves to new accounts and super fans.

I heard a rumour that you don’t get hangovers if you only drink Ūmmi on a night out. Can you verify that personally?
There are a few elements to this. Firstly, it’s very low sugar, so you don’t get that crash the next day. Secondly, the brewing process means that Electrolytes remain in the liquid itself, whilst in most alcohol, they are all gone by the time you drink it, which helps you with the hydration. The final thing vs wine, in particular, is that sulphites are added to wine to enable it to last longer, which also contributes to the hangover. I’ve had a few nights out on it, but in particular, I certainly had like 5 or 6, and the following day, I was up working at 6 am and did a 12-hour day.

organic, vegan and gluten-free

Who are the original founders of Ūmmi, and what are their backgrounds?
It’s Laura Briesenick (co-founder of Copenhagen Coffee Lab), Greg Martin (owner of FRIDAY productions), Chris Hotell (founder of Alex Bottle), Tiago Rodrigues (Founder of Mercearia de Mila) and me.

Ūmmi is co-owned and promoted by a strong team of riders including Arthur Longo, Kevin Backstrom, David Dijte, Nina Brooke, Oski, Lucas Puig, Tom Klocker, Ben Howard, Mikey February, Mia Rose and many more talented individuals. How did you bring together this group, and what do they offer Ūmmi?
Through our various backgrounds, we know many people who we felt would share our objective of making better choices every day. Once we had our plan in place, we contacted everyone and had such great feedback; it was an amazing feeling. For Ūmmi, they offer everything from ideas about how and where we should grow, of course spreading the word, content creation and even helping us open up new accounts.

Co-Owner Mikey February. Photo: Alan Van Gysen

Snowboarders, surfers and skateboarders are already a lot more athletic and health conscious than riders in a previous generation, what do you think has caused this shift and how do you hope to capitalise on it?
I just think some of this is about the examples ahead of us. In the 90s everyone was so young there wasn’t really anyone ahead of us showing the way, so it was a lot of short sightedness in terms of how we are looking after our bodies. Nowadays we see so many great examples, whether it’s someone like Gerry Lopez surfing and snowboarding at the age of 70 because of doing Yoga, Kelly being on tour at 47 years old to numerous other examples. We’re still realistic though and understand that people still want that būzz every now and then, so we created Ūmmi to enable that in a better way.

Where can one purchase Ūmmi Kombucha?
Currently we sell at select locations across Portugal and France. We haven’t launched DTC yet but likely next year we will do.

What are your future plans for Ūmmi?
This winter we’re aiming to get up to Germany, Austria, Switzerland and then next summer scale across Europe.

Co-owner Lucas Puig enjoying his bottle.

You can follow Ūmmi on their Instagram here, and if you want to win a sixpack of Ūmmi, we have 2 x 6 packs to give away on the Pleasure Mag Instagram now.