Curious Elixir - The Science and Soul of Curious Elixir

The Story of a Brand

Ramon Vela

Business, Entrepreneurship

5 • 145 Ratings

🗓️ 28 May 2025

⏱️ 65 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

When you meet someone building a brand with soul, you feel it.

That’s exactly what happened when I spoke with JW Wiseman, the founder of Curious Elixirs, a line of booze-free cocktails that doesn’t just skip the alcohol but adds in adaptogens, bold flavor, and a whole lot of purpose.

We discuss how this brand was born out of personal transformation, how JW is rethinking the celebration culture, and why staying curious has become a guiding principle for both life and business.

This is a story about conscious consumption, brand intimacy, and staying true to your values, even when it’s hard. If you’re interested in building something that blends health, flavor, and meaning, this one’s for you.

Here are a few highlights from the episode:

* Why JW calls Curious a “functional celebration” brand, not just a drink.

* The role of adaptogens and how they elevate the non-alcoholic experience.

* Bootstrapping and finding the right DTC growth model in a nuanced category.

* How they’ve built deep emotional resonance with their community.

* The power of naming, storytelling, and ritual in CPG branding.

Join us in listening to the full episode to hear what it takes to build a movement around conscious consumption, one bottle at a time.

For more on Curious Elixir, visit: https://curiouselixirs.com/

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave The Story of a Brand Show a rating and review.

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Today’s Sponsors:

Compass Rose Ventures - Advisor for CPG Brands: https://compassroseventures.com/contact/

Compass Rose Ventures can help your CPG brand increase customer lifetime value, expand into the US market, create an omnipresent omnichannel footprint, optimize customer journeys, build brand communities, and more. Visit the link above to learn more.

REViVE Amazon Marketing Partners: https://revivemp.com/

REViVE Amazon Marketing Partners helps better-for-you CPG brands win on Amazon with niche expertise, founder-led strategy, and a true partnership model. Built by a CPG founder with a successful exit, REViVE only works with brands they believe in. Curious if Amazon is right for you? Book a Free Deep Dive Strategy Session today.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You know, when we created our first elixir, there definitely was that, and there still is, I think,
0:05.5	with many millions of people, this kind of awareness gap. You know, if you take, you know, one of the
0:11.1	bottles you have there, Curious Number Two, that one is inspired by two different cocktails,
0:16.1	you know, the pineapple margarita and the dark and stormy. And so people are like, what is this?
0:20.6	Is this just
0:21.1	juice? And I'm like, it does have juice in it. We get organic pineapples and we mix that with
0:26.2	orange and lime. But where does the craft come in? The craft comes in in making custom non-alcoholic
0:33.3	extracts of ancho chilis and jalapenos and smoke sea salt and damiana which is an herb that
0:41.1	helps you unwind and organic ginger so that you get a little bit of that burn of star anise so there's
0:46.9	like a touch of almost like fennel to it and then finding the right balance between all of these things
0:52.1	and there's a few other herbs and spices in there, too.
0:54.6	But so that when you first drink it, you're like, oh, I get the bright, fresh pineapple first.
1:00.2	Then it goes into the burn of the jalapeno and the ginger at the back of your throat.
1:06.0	And then you're getting some of the tartness from the lime and the smoke sea salt is mixing in with it.
1:11.5	And then finally the star anus at the end so that you've got all these different things
1:15.7	kind of weaving their way through your mouth.
1:17.8	And so that, and it is another episode of the story of a brand.
1:35.8	Like always, we have an amazing guest and brand that we're going to feature on today's show.
1:39.9	But before we do, hi, I speak to hundreds of founders and CEOs of CPG brands each year,
1:46.3	and they are facing unprecedented challenges from changing consumer behavior, inflation, election
1:53.4	year anxiety, the cost of capital, and more. However, finding an experienced knowledgeable
1:59.3	advisor shouldn't be challenging.
	...

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