PepsiCo recently announced the future launch of a functional beverage formulated for sleep, indicating not only that the multibillion-dollar beverage giant is looking to move away from colas and sugary drinks into more functional, better-for-you territory, but is also responding to the consumer demand for sleep products that any observer would say has been amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
Until recently, most soft drink giants placed a heavy focus on caffeine and other energizing ingredients, however, market researchers project a great deal of growth in market demand for functional beverages marketed toward mood and sleep benefits, a segment inhabited for many years only by small, niche companies.
 
Driftwell, reportedly described by the company as an ‘enhanced water beverage,’ comes in a blackberry lavender flavor. PepsiCo announced that the drink will come in a blackberry lavender flavor, and its sleep support formulation will contain two ingredients – 200 mg of the amino acid L-Theanine, which is present at high concentrations in green tea and has been evidenced in preliminary studies to provide relaxing, mood-boosting effects, and 10% of the recommended daily value of magnesium, an essential nutrient known to be involved in a plethora of cognitive functions.
 
It is reported that Driftwell will reach market availability by 2021. The tentative launch doesn’t represent PepsiCo’s first entry point into the broader functional beverages market. The company’s acquisitions in recent years include those of KeVita, a producer of probiotic drinks and kombucha, and Health Warrior, a producer of plant-based functional snack bars. Leading market researchers in the functional foods and beverages space estimate the current functional beverages market to be somewhere between $30 and $90 billion, depending on which types of beverages qualify, with nowhere to go but up in light of the sales boom catalyzed and sustained by the pandemic.