Creating Categories: Cold Brew's $0 to Premium

In this episode of The Future of Consumer Marketing, host Andres speaks with Mesh Gelman, Founder and CEO of Cumulus Coffee Company. Cumulus is pioneering the premium at-home cold coffee category with the world's first on-demand nitro cold brew system. While the coffee industry saw cold beverages explode from 35% to 75% of Starbucks orders in just six years, no premium at-home solution existed until Cumulus spent five years developing a patented system that extracts nitrogen from ambient air and delivers café-quality cold brew in under a minute. Through relentless customer dialogue and disciplined product development, Mesh built a closed-loop ecosystem that challenges consumers to rethink their entire relationship with cold coffee. Topics Discussed: Creating and validating entirely new product categories in established markets Building a closed-loop hardware and consumables ecosystem Navigating the tension between perfection and speed to market in consumer hardware Pricing strategy when no competitive benchmarks exist Educating consumers about products they don't know they need Leveraging patents and proprietary technology as competitive moats Measuring product-market fit through return rates and repeat purchase behavior Staying curious and learning from younger generations