SANTA CRUZ — Local beverage company meets consumer needs.

LIFEAID Beverage Co. was founded in 2011 in Santa Cruz, California, by two Santa Cruz natives. Co-founders Aaron Hinde and Orion Melehan met at a CrossFit gym in 2009 and bonded over their shared frustration with the limited healthy, functional food and drink options for exercise and recovery.

A statistic in Healthline Media states that, according to the American Heart Association, men should not consume more than 37.5 grams of sugar per day, and women should not consume more than 25 grams per day. For comparison's sake, a 12-ounce can of Red Bull has 39 grams of sugar while a 12-ounce can of LifeAid has only 9 grams and uses all natural ingredients.
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According to Hinde, 70 percent of people now look at a label before they consume something (people care about what they put in their bodies now more than ever). When the company started, that simply wasn’t the norm.
“Instead of having a one-size-fits-all approach with 20 different flavor profiles, we did the exact opposite — we created just six unique blends to support different lifestyles, providing targeted nutrition within our market,” Hinde said.

If you're new to LIFEAID, the six different blends include:

While ImmunityAid is the company's newest blend, Melehan said he expects it to be their number two or three best-selling drink. Today, FitAid and FocusAid currently rank first and second, according to a company spokesperson.

Main product line up from an angle, arranged on a white countertop
LIFEAID Bevereage Co. offers six functional beverages with differing ingredients, flavors and use occasions: LifeAid, FitAid, FocusAid, ImmunityAid, PartyAid and GolferAid. (Photo by Elaine Ingalls)
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A Santa Cruz staple, LIFEAID has 67 employees nationwide with more than 30 of those working locally at the Santa Cruz headquarters located on Mission Street. The company sells drinks in 22 different countries.

“We want to really stand true to what Santa Cruz is all about and create clean, functional products for active lifestyles ...With our clean, nutritional blends, we can really have a positive effect on people’s health.” —Aaron Hinde

The Future of LIFEAID

LIFAID is sold at gyms, CrossFit events, natural food & specialty stores, drug & grocery stores, and is branching out to convenience stores. The brand is on its way to selling in all Nob Hill Foods, 11 of 13 Safeway divisions nationwide and approximately 4,300 Walmarts with a grocery component. The co-founders want to expand headcount, dip their toes into convenience store sales and transition from wholesale distribution to direct-store distribution.

The company has a number of goals for 2019. In terms of revenue, the company is growing more than 50 percent per year, on average. Melehan expects an average of 2.5 million cans sold per month this year, up from last year’s 1.75 million sold per month. In the next five years, the company aspires to reach $200 million in sales. While LIFEAID sales were 100 percent e-commerce a few years ago, according to Hinde, 2019 will be the first year that brick-and-mortar exceeds online sales.

LIFEAID currently has seven warehouses nationwide to help handle this growth ...

> > > Above excerpts taken from original article published on Feb. 17, 2019 in the Santa Cruz Sentinel. You can read the full article by intern Elaine Ingalls at SantaCruzSentinel.com.


For more information about LIFEAID Bevereage Co. and the healthy products they sell, please visit LIFEAIDBevCo.com or call 888-558-1113.