The story of Actiph began when its founder, Jamie Douglas-Hamilton, took on a world record-breaking rowing expedition from Australia to Africa in 2014. The expedition saw the crew consuming 13 litres of water a day. Consuming this quantity of purified water flushed out essential minerals, leading to hallucinations and even loss of consciousness. To combat this, one of the crew decided to mix a small amount of seawater with their drinking water to replenish vital electrolytes. Not only did this seem to work, but that team broke the world record by two weeks.
Douglas-Hamilton went on to research hydration solutions further, eventually discovering Japanese “waterfall” water, ionised water, supercharged to give it a high (alkaline) pH. Seeing its wide-ranging benefits, Douglas-Hamilton went on to launch Actiph Water, bringing its benefits to UK and European customers.
The alkaline water category went on to enjoy exponential growth, exceeding $4.3 billion in sales by 2023, making it one of the fastest-growing soft drink categories.
“As a business, we believe that, with Actiph Water, we have created the best hydration product on the market,” Nicholas Ross, CEO of Actiph. “However, with half of the UK population choosing to drink only flavoured water, we wanted to create an equally innovative, healthy, and functional product for those consumers, delivering on our promise of better health through hydration, for all.”
Actiph wanted to compete in that sector, but without the significant quantity of sugar commonly found in the soft drinks sector. This led to the launch of Acti-Vit – a sparkling, sugar-free vitamin water, available in three flavours, enriched with 100% RDA of seven key vitamins & minerals, and a splash of magnesium.
Since its launch, the drink has secured key placements and has even been invited onto the Tesco incubator scheme, where the supermarket will choose six of its listed brands to support and drive growth within its stores.
That collaboration would lead to Actiph’s most recent innovation, bringing a healthier offering to the energy category.
“Existing energy drinks either contain a great deal of sugar or simply don’t taste good!” Ross points out. “Our goal was to create something that could replace those sugar-filled energy drinks but still maintain a refreshing, great taste.”
In November last year, Acti+ was launched in two flavours, Strawberry & Dragonfruit, and Blood Orange.
A Winning Team
As well as building up a product portfolio, Actiph has been building up a team of 11 full-time heads, with the goal of bringing that number to between 16 and 18 people by the end of 2023.
“I personally feel passionate about the fantastic team we are building, which is key to the growth we are achieving,” Ross tells us. “We have a fantastic culture with a strong growth mindset while cultivating a fun, supportive environment to work in.”
Actiph lays particular emphasis on the individual applying for a role, rather than just their CV or experience. Attitude and aptitude are often the deciding factors when choosing between equally qualified candidates.
“Having a great team dynamic and the right skills mix is so important to our success, as well as ensuring a terrific working environment,” Ross says. “We are investing even more in training and development in 2023 and trying to support this further with internal team training. Every month we have a two-day team meeting and social to ensure all the team are well integrated and spend time with others outside of their own functions.”
In line with its values, Actiph also offers a monthly health allowance to try to encourage the team to be active and ensures they are well-hydrated with a monthly stock drop.
Indeed, in every aspect of the business, hydration remains a core value.
“Linked to our vision of delivering health through hydration, all our products are designed and developed to give consumers the best possible proposition for the occasion, without consuming unnecessary calories,” Ross says. “Whether sports recovery, getting the vitamins required for a healthy diet, or a natural energy boost, we provide great tasting drinks, produced to the highest standards, that provide additional functional benefits.”
A Rapid Growth Story
Actiph’s story is one of incredible growth, but rapid growth always comes with challenges.
“Funding the business and ensuring you have the cash required to fund the working capital growth is always the biggest challenge,” Ross admits. “We operate in a very competitive category with major, well-established players. So, we are competing for the same space as those with much deeper pockets and far greater resources at their disposal.”
Actiph has a big job to do in winning distribution, as well as educating consumers on making healthier choices and changing habits from traditional unhealthy beverages.
“We have had a great deal of support from our investors and a real belief in the business, which has been fundamental in us scaling to where we are today,” Ross says. “Despite the competitive environment, we work with some really great businesses who want to offer more choice as well as healthier beverage offerings to their customers and have been willing to take a chance on a smaller brand.”
However, Actiph’s growth has depended on relationships up, as well as down the supply chain, and it has nurtured great relationships with its production facilities and despite the water shortages in the summer, the business was able to avoid any supply problems and ensure its customers remained stocked.
“Building strong relationships with our suppliers is really important to us so we can work collaboratively to overcome such challenges,” Ross points out. “This has been more important than ever over the last couple of years with all the raw material price increases and other inflationary pressures on our supply chain, and has allowed us to remain price competitive in the market.”
Looking forward, Actiph plans to continue its strong growth in the UK and build its distribution in the Middle East and Europe.
“I believe we have a strong portfolio of products now, so need to focus on growing our core rather than growth through further innovation,” Ross says. “We will do this by building our internal resources as we already have strong systems and infrastructure in place to scale.”
Actiph is a great brand story about a company offering products that are truly innovative rather than replicating what is already in the market. Through partnerships and sampling, the company has achieved strong repeat rates, breaking through in a noisy marketplace and competing with massive media budgets.
