UPs An Interesting Product

UPs SolidEnergy is our innovative new caffeine energy sweet which we launched in Manchester, January 2013.

Kaffeination consists of four founders, three of whom studied together in Manchester doing their Masters in Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship. The fourth founder studied Business and Engineering in Dresden, Germany.

The team has an international background, complementary skills and a unified passion for innovation.

I have come across this product a couple of days ago, it is called Ups.

What I have found incredible at first glance was the idea behind it. What they are basically trying to distribute is a sweet which is able to give the energy you need during the day. If you are not able to drink coffee or have an energy drink, Ups is the solution for you. In fact, just 16g of this product are equal to one cup of coffee, in terms of the Caffeine that they have.

At this moment, the only flavour that they are producing is Strawberry, which I think is probably the most interesting they could have chosen. However if they want to take this further they will have to able to produce other different flavours. In my opinion lemon, orange, pineapple, melon and pear could be the next ones. Even if I would try to make something completely different with a “banana” flavour, which I think it has never been tried before by anyone.

The product comes out in two versions, the 16g and the 50g pack. I have been lucky enough to test both and I can easily suggest to stick to the smaller one, which contains the equivalent of one cup of coffee and it is not too addictive. Further it is small enough to fit in your pocket; you can do the same thing with the second version, but I think it is too big to bring it around.

In the next months they will probably face two main issues: distribution and the improvement of the product. The distribution, from what I have been able to see, has been achieved in the best way as possible by starting from the University of Manchester user base. On the other hand the improvement of the product will have to focus on the next flavours and on a low calories product.

Even though it is just a sweet, it has up to 333 calories per 100 grams; which is not a lot, but this number can be lowered. Here you can find the nutrional table, which gives you a general idea:

I have been able to test it during revision time today and I have to admit that I am pretty well satisfied by it. I have tried the small pack first, which I think it is the right caffeine for my body, and it was useful and even tasty. It remembered me a lot hairbo, but with a different vision. That is what makes them different from other sweets. They are trying to distribute a product that can help people, not just a mere sweet that is able to fill our greediness.

I believe they will have to work on their vision a lot, because that’s what it makes them unique and different by the others. Although this looks like a small market, it can be a huge one for the simple fact that there isn’t one yet. They are introducing a different way of gaining solid energy to achieve what we want.

That’s why they might find a big user base in students, who are constantly studying, revising and trying to do more at University; but also in professional workers, who need to be focused on what they are doing for hours, without any break. Being in a University is extremely important if you want to start a project like this one, because you can actually see how the product flows goes by testing it directly. Further students have connections all over other Universities, which are important assets for this product.

In fact they can use the Facebook distribution model from one University to the next one, University by University. If the product is good enough, it will take over even in the offices, impacting the niche we were talking about; but there is still time for that. Now they just need to focus on students, because they will be the future professional workers.

I am definitely going to order more packs for the next exams and I suggest you doing the same at this website get-ups.com

This article first appeared here: http://greatpreneurs.com/ups-interesting-sweet/

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