Can drinking water look cool? That was the driving question behind Liquid Death founder Mike Cessario’s big business idea. Since launching its first tallboy cans of water in 2019, Liquid Death has used humor, design and smirk-worthy marketing to grow into a beverage company valued at $1.4 billion. Mike talks with host Jeff Berman about how he built the irreverent brand to help him escape his professional boredom.
Chapters:
00:00:00 Finding inspiration at Warped Tour
00:02:36 Punk & entrepreneurial roots
00:05:00 Creating disruptive advertisements for corporate clients
00:13:35 “I need to create my own product”
00:17:01 Mike Cessario’s first entrepreneurial endeavor
00:30:32 Creating brands for the organic industry
00:34:43 Landing on the idea to sell water
00:38:07 Uncovering the logistics of canned water
00:44:55 Coming up with the name Liquid Death
00:47:35 Landing on the Liquid Death logo
00:50:29 Raising $150K
00:56:27 Scaling Liquid Death with humor
01:01:01 Inside Liquid Death’s early distribution strategy
01:04:59 Diversifying the Liquid Death product line
01:11:13 Marketing for people who hate marketing
01:15:37 The best and worst parts of running Liquid Death
01:19:31 Advice for the reluctant entrepreneur working a dead-end job
01:21:03 Advice for the entrepreneur who can’t find product market fit
01:22:55 How Masters of Scale helped Mike Cessario build Liquid Death