Munich Startup: What does Redrink do? What problem does it solve?
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: Redrink is the first digital and bottleless beverage service, which supplies its users with delicious drinks tailored to their personal taste via a beverage dispenser. The drinks are produced directly on-site – for example, in offices. Redrink thus solves several problems at once and satisfies important needs of our time: Firstly, costs and effort are reduced for companies. They no longer have to worry about procuring and transporting bottles for their employees. The time required for companies with Redrink is only around 15 minutes per week; we take care of the majority of the work. Bottled drinks are also expensive – up to 60 percent more than our bottleless drinks.
Furthermore, choosing Redrink is not an "either-or" situation: either bland water or over-sugared, always-the-same-tasting soft drinks. Redrink means Drinks according to your personal tasteWhether mild or fizzy, a little sweeter or just with a light, delicate aroma: Redrink provides its users with a wide variety of flavors, mostly in organic quality.
And most importantly: Redrink protects our environment. We follow a "the best packaging is no packaging" approach. Even the often highly praised use of glass bottles harms our environment more than we realize. After all, they also have to be transported and cleaned, which results in significant CO2 emissions. Redrink prevents the use of 51,000 bottles per company and reduces CO2 emissions by several dozen tons.
We already support numerous companies such as Celonis, Foodji, Recogni and Spendit with our beverage solution – and we see that these companies place particular emphasis on sustainability.
Redrink digitizes and refines existing technologies
Munich Startup: But that has been around for a long time!
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: Yes and no. Yes, the technology we're building on has been around for decades, especially in the hospitality and restaurant industries, and regular water dispensers exist as well. But there haven't been any major changes here in years. Redrink digitizes and refines existing technology in the beverage dispenser sector, thus ensuring greater applicability that can be implemented in many locations, including offices, airports, and public spaces. We ensure a more diverse and high-quality taste experience. – Our essences are mostly organic. Redrink ensures that the desired flavors reach companies – because let's be honest – everyone's tastes are different. With Redrink, companies can offer their employees exactly the drinks they like.
Munich Startup: What is your founding story?
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: Neither of us are fans of plain tap water; for us, drinks, especially in the summer, always had to offer flavor and fizz. We both had the bad habit of, for example, being unable to resist an expensive bottle of soft drink from the vending machine on a hot summer day. And we talked about our guilty consciences about using plastic bottles. But a guilty conscience alone doesn't improve anything. So we decided there had to be something concrete to do: Use the resource that's already there: tap water. But move away from bottles and create drinks tailored to your own taste: The idea for Redrink was born.
Munich Startup: What have been your biggest challenges so far?
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: Turning an initially idealistic idea into practice was certainly the biggest challenge. Filtering out what might be a bit fantastical from what was actually feasible—basically, simply implementing our idea in practice, which ultimately turned out exactly as we envisioned.
Revolution in drinking behavior
Munich Startup: Where would you like to be in one year, where in five years?
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: "Always think big" is our philosophy. Therefore, our goal is to revolutionize drinking habits in Germany and Austria – sustainable, smartly personalized, and healthy. Within a year, we want to be present in the largest metropolitan areas in Austria and Germany and grow as a company to the point where we can manage this effort. In five years, Redrink should be a brand that everyone in Europe knows, and ideally beyond.
Munich Startup: How have you experienced Munich as a startup location so far?
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: Munich proved to be a suitable startup location for us. With our initial idea and pitch deck, we were welcomed with open arms at Xplore. We then moved on to being accepted into the TUM Venture Labs and the Exist funding program, supported by TUM (and as probably the first team not based at TUM). We maintain close contact and maintain good relationships with all universities and their incubators, and have consistently received broad support from all sides.
Munich Startup: Public transport or bicycle?
Adrian Beissel, Redrink: In Munich, we commute 90 percent of the time by bike, and in winter we also like to use public transport. But nothing beats Munich's spring and summer cycling adventures.
