Transcript
The Brief Interviewer (00:18.542)
Welcome everyone to a special episode of The Brief. The following interview with Bryon Evans of Cypher Energy was filmed live at our invitation only Olivon Advisors Spring 2025 conference in Austin, Texas. Let’s get started. Bryon, tell us a little about why you were excited for the launch of Cypher Energy.
Bryon Evans (00:40)
Well, I’m incredibly excited about Cypher Energy for a number of reasons. This is my baby, number one. So it’s my first baby from that perspective. And the category continues to grow. Cypher is really the only Hispanic Latino energy drink on the market today. We found a number of trends in terms of non-carb, zero sugar, with gray flavors that feel and act and taste like a juice. And we think Cypher is the next big thing in the energy segment across the doors of America and really very happy about that.
The Brief Interviewer (01:19)
Tell us a little bit about the macro environment for energy drinks.
Bryon Evans (01:25)
Well, I’ve been a player in the man energy segment for since 2000. The category continues to evolve. We’ve had, you know, started with Red Bull and it’s now segmentation. It’s growing. It’s almost $100 billion globally. In the United States, is the most premium market in the around the world by a wide margin. You’re starting to see segmentation in terms of, know, the NOS customer, for example, is a car enthusiast. The Rockstar is a party like a rockstar. You’ve got an altar premium in Red Bull. You’ve got a blue collar in Monster. And none of those folks are targeting the Hispanic Latino community who’s the number two user of energy drinks. We continue to see growth. Energy drinks are more profitable than CSDs and other non-out in the market today and they continue to be adding space at retail across all channels.
The Brief Interviewer (02:26)
The Hispanic market is certainly an underserved and growing market. Can you give us some statistics on why you chose this path?
Bryon Evans (02:34)
Sure. 66 million people reside in the United States that are Hispanic Latino, one out of five people. They have $2.6 trillion of spending power in the United States today. They’re underserved in terms of their groceries, they’re underserved in their energy, they’re underserved in their beverages. And you continue to see that across multiple major retailers. For example, Walmart, Kroger, Safeway are building Mercado Isles to get new flavors across not only energy drinks, but other Hispanic Latino products in the United States. White, brown, and black folks are also buying Hispanic Latino. You know, we use the UCLA data part for all our data for Hispanics in the United States. It’s a great resource if you haven’t seen it or used it. And I would tell you that the largest growth will continue to be Hispanic for the next 20 years, according to UCLA.
The Brief Interviewer (03:35)
Your team has had many successful exits and been involved in household names in the CPG space. Can you give us some color on that?
Bryon Evans (03:44)
Well, we’re very lucky to have our team. We’ve had multiple exits in terms of CPG items across bars, drinks, beverages, et cetera. Most recently, we did a great coffee company called Black Rifle Coffee. And we started with them. They were a great veteran-owned company. They asked us to create what’s called a ready-to-drink. beverage, coffee, and we took it from zero to 134 million over a three-year period. They entered SPAC, they entered going public, and we were very active during that period supporting all their needs. was a ton of work for the team and for them and for us, and we’re very proud of that win. It’s a very good thing to do for veterans when we do that.
The Brief Interviewer (04:38)
Talk to us about your distribution, aside from the drink itself, and the very hip and cool branding. This seems to be a strong point for Cypher.
Bryon Evans (04:46)
It definitely is a strong point for Cypher. My background was a Red Bull distributorship in Ohio. It taught me everything about the business for corporate Red Bull. We did that for about 11 years. We were very successful getting 100 % distributions in multiple cities. And it’s really translated into kind of a DSD language. So when we go see a distributor like Odom Coke or Admiral Pepsi or Jack Hilliard here in Texas. We already know their challenges. We already understand what they want from us. And we do it a little easier than everyone else. And I think that’s what makes us so efficient to get distribution around the country. Today for Cipher, we have about 110 million people coverage or committed to. And we’re going to continue to ramp that up in strategies.
The Brief Interviewer (05:37)
How soon can we expect to see Cipher on the shelves of C stores, grocery, and big box?
Bryon Evans (05:44)
Well, you can see Cypher in retail today. So Circle K, QT divisions around the country. Our concentrations are in North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, some Georgia, obviously Texas. We’re getting ready to launch Anabio Oil, which would be California all the way through. It’s about thousand stores call it the West Coast all way down through Florida. Again, we’re trying to get where the heavy heaviest population of Hispanics are number one. Number two, that’s all in C store. We also have some military going in from a base perspective. and then lastly, we have started to work with Kroger. We do have a vendor number at Kroger today, which is it’s a long, long process. We got that completed and we’re going to start looking at Kroger’s maybe mid year of this year. We’ve sent out, you know, for smart and final HEB, Walmart and Sam’s. And we think there’s a great opportunity for not only for the clubs, but also the grocers as well.
The Brief Interviewer (06:45)
Lastly, can you tell us about your experience here at the Olivon Spring Conference 2025?
Bryon Evans (06:52)
Well, this is my first conference. I’ll start with that. And we really enjoyed this process. It was a great group. It was very interactive. We didn’t know how that would go for a CPG item with all the finances and financial companies out there today. I thought there was a lot of energy, no pun intended, from that perspective. But we were very happy, and we would definitely do it again.
The Brief Interviewer (07:17)
Thank you for joining us here at The Brief by Olivon Advisors. For more information on our presenters, please visit olivonadvisors.com/companies. Want to join our mailing list? You can by signing up at olivonadvisors.com. We look forward to seeing you on the next episode of The Brief.
