Scent Over Sugar: How Air Up Is Rethinking a Daily Essential
Interview with Toma Perret
What is your favourite drink when you‘re not drinking water?
I must confess that I can’t do without a glass of wine from my birth region, Lavaux, in Switzerland. Or a drop of Mastika that reminds me of Greece, where I spent many summers as a child with my parents. Sometimes, though, it can also be a solid German beer. After all, I’m fortunate to have married a Bavarian. I think taste says a lot about people’s lives...
Who came up with the idea of imparting flavour to water through scent?
I believe Lena and Tim never thought this amazing idea would work commercially. And honestly, many people told them the same at the beginning. However, the founding team booked a three-day sales spot with the last bit of capital at a retailer. After the first day, they had to pack everything up. Not because they hadn’t sold anything but because all the bottles sold out within a few hours. The simple truth is that the product has potential when consumers tell you it does. To this day, that’s still what drives our decisions at air up.
When did it become clear that this business idea had potential?
I believe Lena and Tim never thought this amazing idea would work commercially. And honestly, many people told them the same at the beginning. However, the founding team booked a three-day sales spot with the last bit of capital at a retailer. After the first day, they had to pack everything up. Not because they hadn’t sold anything but because all the bottles sold out within a few hours. The simple truth is that the product has potential when consumers tell you it does. To this day, that’s still what drives our decisions at air up.
Who is your target audience?
You are. I am. And so are your children. Everyone, basically. Developing healthy habits starts from a very young age, and we believe that with air up, we can make significant contributions to people’s overall health. Our products enable them to hydrate daily with a natural, tasty twist. Furthermore, our idea has received broad approval from young target groups from the outset, and we see them as our source of inspiration: globally, they are the pioneers of new behaviours, and in an ultra-connected world, they can even inspire older generations. It’s never too late to pay more attention to your health. At 50 years old, I can say that I now – excuse my French – drink a lot of water. And not just compared to my Swiss favourite wine or German beer.
How crucial do you think design is to the success of a product?
Design has always been and always will be the first point of contact for brands. It quickly tells and anchors what a brand stands for, reflecting a company’s attitude. Of course, design is also a marketing tool that helps stand out from the crowd and be noticeable and memorable in the digital noise.
Can good marketing compensate for less good design – how?
There’s a principle that every new company must recognise early on. A message is not just its content and dissemination, but also, and perhaps most importantly: the form. It’s important to invest in design early on because it’s the first by-product that drives the business. A strong idea poorly designed is less accessible, less connecting, and less trustworthy
An explicit goal of air up is „sustainability through design throughout the entire product lifecycle.“ What are the biggest challenges in this regard and how do you address them?
In the beginning, our financial resources, like those of all start-ups, were very limited. Additionally, we lacked the network to find partners who could produce the product in Europe according to our ideas and quality standards. We quickly realised that this is a journey where every detail and every step counts. This process requires a lot of planning, iteration, and often stumbling. That’s part of the truth. But we’ve already achieved a lot: for example, by shifting our entire production to the EU, we reduce the transport distance for the pods by up to 15,000 kilometres. Less transport means less pollution. Our pod production in the Netherlands is entirely powered by wind energy, and our Tritan bottle plant in Austria sources 100 percent of its electricity from renewable sources. Additionally, our modular drinking system is extremely durable – you only need to replace it where it breaks. I’m particularly proud that this year we will be introducing a pod made from a more sustainable, food-safe material. It’s a bio-based plastic
How do you integrate sustainability into your brand work?
As mentioned above, sustainability is a challenge for every brand. That applies to us too. We had to invest quite a bit of manpower, time, and financial resources to correct the course we had taken at the beginning of our journey. Our basic principle is to always stay truthful to our customers. The same goes for sustainability: it starts with the product, which is also the foundation of our brand. We transparently show what we do well and where we could or should improve, and we don’t try to earn cheap sympathy points by building our brand or communication around a very serious topic like sustainability. Our product is inherently much more sustainable than drinks in disposable bottles, and of course, there is still room for improvement! When we make meaningful progress, we’ll talk about it. It can even inspire others to do the same. The truth is, there is no company without any ecological footprint, and responsible business conduct should be the norm.
Can you spill the beans a little and tell us what you have planned for the coming years?
We are only at the beginning of our journey, and there is still a lot to do. Many passionate people in very diverse teams are working on it. I want to be completely honest: we don’t know exactly what tomorrow will bring yet. We work every day to understand the needs and expectations of our customers in order to further improve our offering. That’s our ambition. But so much can be said: in the very near future, younger children and their parents should keep an eye on us. And also those
who like bold or high-quality design …
