Single serve wine brand Zipz looks to hit UK shelves early 2015

By Gemma McKenna

Published: 15 December, 2014

Single serve PET wine glass Zipz, which took the US by storm after securing the largest ever investment on the country's TV show Shark Tank, is aiming to hit UK shelves by the first quarter of 2015.

Zipz Zipz, the single serve wine brand from the US, is looking to enter the UK within the next few months.

J Henry Scott, chief executive of Zipz, told Harpers.co.uk it is in the "middle of finding the right distribution partner" in the UK, and is working with the company who developed the Copa di Vino product in France on developing a stem glass for it.

The company was started in 2012, after Scott came up with what he felt was an improved design on existing single serve wine glasses, which was taken on by Zachy's in New York.

Scott has already signed deals with Yellow Tail and Concha y Toro's California flagship Fetzer, and has had talks with a number of other major producers in the US about licensing Zipz for their brands. A major market for Zipz has so far proved to be sporting stadia across the US.

Scott applied to go on Shark Tank - the US equivalent of Dragon's Den - and managed to secure the largest ever investment in the show's history, at $2.5 million. Shark, or angel investor, Kevin O'Leary, stumped up the cash, and Lori Greiner, another shark, subsequently came on board. O'Leary, who has his own vineyard, has strong retail links and the brand is now working on a product for Costco, the US's biggest wine retailer, with his help.

Since the show aired Scott said it has been a "whirlwind", with over 300,000 people visiting its site, and hundreds of potential investors and distributors from all over the world contacting him. Scott said: "The major retail brands have called about private labelling for them, and some ultra-famous celebrities have contacted us about doing a branded private label". "It's been beyond anything I could have imagined," he said.

The exposure has also seen the brand appear on major TV news programmes and talk shows. Scott said the 'sharks' are able to "set up meetings for national roll out - it's changed everything".

It is also in the process of developing a spirits glass, and Scott says it is in negotiations with "the top five liquor companies in the world - the major household names in vodka, tequila and bourbon brands" about producing cocktails. Scott sees this as taking off in 2015. Talks are also underway for its existing wine glass with distributors in Europe, eastern Europe, Canada and central America.

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