Aussie startups combine collagen and kombucha to make beauty in a bottle
Startups
Two Australian startups have joined forces to launch a health and beauty drink containing the fashionable protein collagen.
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Beverage company Utonic and wellness brand Vani-T, two startups from Adelaide, South Australia, recently launched their Collagen Beauty Elixir online.
The drink is the latest in Utonic’s range of “functional beverages,” which aim to provide a range of health benefits.
It combines Vani-T’s bovine collagen power and Utonic’s sugar-free kombucha.
Utonic co-founder Michael Brinkley told InDaily Vani-T approached the company about a potential collaboration in January – prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Brinkley said he’d thought the product development would be simple but creating the beverage was trickier than he’d originally anticipated.
“It was based on our existing product, which is the sugar-free kombucha. So, in essence, it was supposed to be just a simple collaboration of putting the collagen in the existing drink,” he said.
“But, unfortunately, when you mix certain ingredients, they don’t always play together nicely. Collagen is a very stable product, so I thought it wouldn’t be too difficult, but as soon as we started putting the collagen with the drink it was very lively. Any carbonation was giving the drink a lot of life, and making it jump around a lot.
“But then when COVID-19 hit it allowed me to give myself a bit more time to really invest into it – because everything else stopped.
“I ended up ensuring there was no carbonation in the drink – so it’s a still drink.”
Utonic has 12 beverages in its range of 100 per cent natural and sugar-free drinks, which fall into four ranges: natural tonics, kombucha zero, superfood drinks and the collagen beauty elixir.
Vani-T offers a range of collagen products, including tea powders and supplements.
Collagen is the most abundant protein in the human body and is a major component of skin, bones, muscles, cartilage and nails.
According to a report into collagen by the New York Times in 2019, while the benefits behind ingesting the edible structural protein were still largely unknown, there were no downsides to taking the recommended dose of collagen peptides.
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