Recess raises $30M Series B to scale its magnesium-based wellness beverage brand

Summary

Recess has closed a $30 million Series B led by Kavu, the consumer beverage fund best known as the primary backer of Poppy, which sold to PepsiCo for approximately $2 billion earlier in 2025. Kavu's founder also led VitaminWater through its $4 billion sale to Coca-Cola, giving the firm a track record that carries significant weight in beverage M&A circles.

From CBD to Magnesium to Mocktails

Recess launched as a CBD beverage, a category that proved difficult to sustain at scale. Founder and CEO Ben Weprin repositioned the brand around magnesium — citing that roughly 70% of Americans are deficient in the mineral — and framed the pivot not around an ingredient but around a durable consumer feeling: relaxation as a counterpart to the stimulation that built Red Bull (founded 1987), Monster Energy, and Starbucks.

Monster Energy's stock performance underpins the investment thesis. Weprin notes it was the best-performing stock of the past 20 years, compounding from a roughly $7 billion base, illustrating how category-defining beverage brands can generate tech-like returns when they ride a genuine secular trend.

In 2023, Recess launched a ready-to-drink mocktail line, anticipating that RTD mocktails would mirror the trajectory of non-alcoholic beer — growing alongside RTD cocktails and hard seltzer while traditional beer remained flat to declining.

Business Profile and Use of Capital

The company currently runs roughly 50% e-commerce, with the remainder in retail. It generates an estimated 100 to 150 organic tagged posts per day across Instagram and TikTok, driven primarily by its core female consumer base, with minimal paid brand marketing to date.

Weprin draws an explicit contrast to Poppi and Liquid Death, noting Recess has pulled virtually none of the brand-marketing levers those companies used. The Series B capital is directed at three priorities: scaling the team, expanding retail distribution, and reigniting brand marketing. Walmart and Costco are flagged as the near-term distribution targets that would signal the brand has reached critical mass.

Distribution and Channel Strategy

Instacart, GoPuff, and DoorDash are cited as meaningful current channels. Weprin is not prioritizing drone delivery or emerging last-mile formats, describing the omnichannel build — particularly large-format retail — as the more immediate value driver. The brand's e-commerce base, while substantial at half of revenue, is viewed as a foundation rather than the growth engine for the next phase.