PepsiCo has chosen North American beverage company Barfresh Food Group as its exclusive sales representative within the foodservice channel to offer Barfresh’s ready-to-blend smoothies and frozen beverages line throughout the US and Canada.
The agreement also entails rights regarding international markets where Barfresh currently does not sell its products and brand extensions in the grocery stores across the US and Canada.
Barfresh offers natural smoothies, shakes, frappes without artificial flavors, colours or preservatives. The offerings are also gluten-free, kosher certified, and smoothies made with real fruit.
Barfresh Food Group CEO Riccardo Delle Coste said:"Through our agreement with PepsiCo North America Beverages, we can now be included as part of its offerings to a significant base of customers. Additionally, we will be able to fast track our growth and expedite the test to market process with large national accounts.
"There is significant opportunity for Barfresh in the $25BN frozen blended beverage category and this exclusive agreement with PepsiCo North America Beverages will help to accelerate our continued growth in North America and beyond."
PepsiCo Global Foodservice president Kirk Tanner said: "PepsiCo offers consumers and customers a wide array of food and beverage choices from our comprehensive product portfolio. We're pleased to now include Barfresh's high-quality, great-tasting smoothies and frozen beverages as another platform we can present to our foodservice customers. This is a fast-growing category that will add value for our partners."
Recently, PepsiCo entered into partnership with Israel-based at-home soda machine maker SodaStream to offer caps filled with Pepsi and Sierra Mist to flavor water carbonated by these machines. Soft drink companies are partnering with soda appliances in the US, where sales continue to fall over the last 10 years due to growing health concerns linked to consumption of sugary drinks.
