🚀 Your Weekly Slice of Food, Drink & Wellness Startups #7

Hey 👋

Welcome back to the Startup Slice!

This week we’re diving into some more great brand collabs, young founders who have managed to raise >£140k in investment and discussing the use of AI in startups. We hope you enjoy and as ever, please respond to this email with any feedback!

👀 Keep an eye out on our LinkedIn for Will Smith x XOXO soda joining forces…

📱 From the Feed

What we posted on our socials this week:

🍬 SoSweet did £5M on TikTok shop last year. From a small business in the South West to “The UK’s Favourite Sweet Shop” 🔗 read here

🍹 Bhangra Blends raised £140k for their RTD south asian inspired cocktail and mocktail brand. 🔗 read here

🎌 M&S launched the same product as Kwenched. See how Co-Founder Faith responded. 🔗 read here

👀 ICYMI: Brand Moves Worth Watching

🌶️ Pimentae Cocktails hosted a pop-up in Waitrose. The iconic tequila cocktails in a can brand set up at the bar in Waitrose King’s Cross, serving up free cocktails and full pours for customers to sip on. Combine the drinks with the impressive bar decorations, it was an incredible brand activation move. They were able to get out to their target market and get people trying the product (always super important for food & drink brands!!).

🧈 All Things Butter x Remass collaboration event. Remass is a vintage store in London and to celebrate their yellow vintage styles, they collaborated with Beigel King and All Things Butter. They served up the buttered bagels in store to reach new audiences. The event seemed to be a hit but we’re a bit unsure if it’s an effective brand collaboration, do you think this partnership makes sense?

🍷 🍕 Nice x Homeslice launched a food & drink collaboration. Nice wines and Homeslice pizza have launched a £10 combo for a slice of pizza and a can of wine. It’s neatly packaged in an iconic baby pink box to complement the wine cans. We think this is another example of great brand collaborations, bringing together a startup and a more established restaurant in London drawing in new customers for Nice.

💡 Bitesize Playbook for Startups : How AI tools can be used to grow startups

As we all know, AI is a huge topic at the moment, and probably will be for a long time. 

Startups that adopt AI aren’t the leaders anymore, it’s more of a necessity so that you don’t fall behind. 

If you’re not using AI to automate processes and grow your business, it's time to take a look and reassess how you’re using it to your advantage.

And no, we’re not just talking about using ChatGPT for ideas on your next marketing campaign or writing an email for you. 

We’re talking about much more specific uses and leveraging tools that use AI to help your startup throughout the ins and outs of the business. 

The good news about AI is that when you’re a startup, it can make your lean teams and tight budgets go even further than they have before. 

To think deeper about how to use AI, go beyond the ChatGPT examples before.

→ Assess inefficiencies/struggles within the business

→ Research and implement AI tools that can help you with it

Yes, it really can be that simple.

 To give you some more context, we’ve listed out some tools and example use cases below. (By no means is this an exhaustive list!)

• In the process of raising funding and finding it difficult?

  • PitchBob → A pitch deck generator 

  • ProAI → Help to produce a business plan and even financial predictions and marketing plans

• Creating a GTM strategy for your product?

  • HubSpot AI → AI driven one-page website builder

  • ChatSpot → Acts an assistant from image generation to analysing company data to analysing competitors in a market

• Trying to scale?

  • Sifted Logistics Intelligence → Helps you manage your supply chain

  • Eightfold AI → AI tool for hiring, find talent that matches your company needs and manage the recruitment process

And that’s just to name a few.

There’s definitely not enough space and time for us to go into too much detail in just one newsletter so we encourage you to take a look into AI and how you can use it best for your startup.

📌 The Noticeboard

Your weekly list of things to check out:

📣 Events

• Future of Food: Entries are now open for the 2nd Future of Food Competition, a free, inclusive event spotlighting bold ideas that could transform the way we grow, eat, and think about food. Pitch your concept live to industry leaders, connect with top investors and innovators, and compete for prizes at the Grand Final on 27th November 2025 at the Royal Geographical Society in London. Apply now and shape the future of food!

• Taste of London returns to Regent’s Park from 18–22 June 2025, bringing together the city’s top restaurants, chefs, and artisan producers for five days of culinary celebration. Enjoy signature dishes, live entertainment, fire-fueled theatrics, and hands-on workshops in the heart of London. Don’t miss your chance to taste, learn, and experience the best of the capital’s food scene!

📚 Read/Listen

HUNGRY Podcast. Episode: The £300m Brand Exit Expert.

This podcast dives into how David Milner, current chairman at DASH Water turns challenger brands like Tyrrells, Crosta Mollica, St. Pierre, Lily’s Kitchen into household names and golden exits.

Thanks for reading this week’s edition! As mentioned, check out our LinkedIn for more regular updates.

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