Boba-preneurship: Disrupting a Multibillion Dollar Industry

Who doesn’t love boba?

Seriously.

And if you don’t, pardon my French, but Are you kidding me?

Rewind a few years back. Did you know that boba was actually on the decline, before GenZ started reviving it again?

In fact, here is a graph showing the interest in boba over the last five years:

Boba, the chilled milk tea drink, has been surging in popularity of late.

Which means, your late night boba runs may have a very large payoff to them afterall.

But, before you business minds start schemin’, let’s first take a step back and look at some of the nutritional effects of boba.

Traditional, 8 Ounce tapioca boba has:

• Around 28 grams of carbs

• Barely any protein

• Around 28 grams of sugar

• Sweet, sweet tapioca pearls. Did I mention how sweet these are?

• Around 15 mg of calcium

You could say that boba is nutritionally a middle-of-the-pack drink or mid, but it tastes so good, to so many people.

Which begs the question: why hasn’t someone made a nutritionally exceptional boba drink that taste just as good?

Seems like a great, layup opportunity.

In fact, let’s dive into a new startup business that’s doing just this.

The Story of Bubluv:

Bubluv, founded in 2019 by Diana Ark Chen, set out to create a healthier boba tea alternative. Basically, she created an alternative with no sugar, and no artificial ingredients, all while being less than 50 calories.

The sweetener Diana uses in the boba-alternative is monk-fruit, a healthier alternative to the sugar found in boba.

It better be the same taste, though (if any of you readers have tried it, be sure to let us know).

Anyway’s, Diana’s done a fantastic job with her healthy boba alternative, and a key driver of Diana’s success was the relentless use of organic TikTok and Instagram reel content. Hopefully, she takes it to the moon.

A quick break for our AI joke of the day:

Why was the boba sad?

Because it lost its tapioca balls...

Anyways, here’s our second case study for today:

Bobacino

Drumroll please….the robot, that -get this- makes boba for you.

And its name is Bobacino. Bobacino is essentially an automated boba serving bar, that allows any boba maker to integrate it into their boba production flow.

A buddy of mine used to tell me, “during a gold rush, sell the shovels”. And he’s absolutely right.

Objectively, the boba market, a $2 billion market, is booming, and providing the infrastructure in this situation makes total sense.

Specifically, Bobacino’s founder, Darian Ahler, charges $50,000 for each boba machine, and sells specifically to mom-and-pop stores, with the goal of eliminating lines. It might sound like a very expensive item at first glance, but it helps businesses save on labor expenses. Ahler further emphasizes that this technology will integrate with PopID facial recognition software, making the payment process that much smoother.

Ahler’s pursuing a brilliant strategy to tackle the $10 billion, and growing global food automation market. (We hope to interview Darian on our new podcast very soon!)

Cool. So, what can I build in this space?

Here are a few quick ideas for ya:

1. Start a Pop-up boba bar: Students in college campuses are always looking for boba

2. Make a vending-machine for boba: you can place it in any areas with heavy foot traffic

3. Make an extremely really healthy version of it (we’re talking uber-healthy. Watch out, Bubluv).

4. Let's make an AI powered automation tool for boba on the blockchain (kidding- you can restrain yourself, VCs...)

Anyways lads, enjoy sipping on your boba tonight, and if you’re in the mood for it, create that boba-filled business.