Coca-Cola is discontinuing Honest Tea by the end of 2022, in a move the brand's cofounder called a 'gut punch'

• Coca-Cola is dropping Honest Tea from its ready-to-drink tea lineup.
• Honest Tea was once once of Coke's most successful non-soda acquisitions.

Coca-Cola announced this week that it would discontinue production and sales of Honest Tea products by the end of 2022.

The beverage giant said in a press release eliminating Honest Tea is part of a larger strategy to "reflect consumer choice" and an effort to prioritize "fewer, bigger brands." Coca-Cola cut several underperforming "zombie" brands in 2020 to focus on more profitable labels during the pandemic. Around 200 brands were axed, including Tab and Zico, cutting the corporation's portfolio in half.

"Today's announcement by The Coca-Cola Company that they will be discontinuing Honest Tea is a gut punch to all the sweat, tears, and incredible passion that went into building our beloved brand," Honest Tea cofounder Seth Goldman wrote on LinkedIn following the news.

Goldman started Honest Tea in 1998 with cofounder Barry Nalebuff, later selling a 40% stake to Coca-Cola in 2008. The conglomerate fully acquired Honest Tea in 2011, and Goldman continued working for the brand until 2019, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Honest Tea was once a shining example of Coca-Cola's ability to acquire and grow non-soda brands, Alex Bitter reported for Insider last year. Sales for Honest Tea reached $600 million in 2019, up from just $71 million in 2010 before it came under the Coca-Cola umbrella.

It was so successful it graduated from the Venturing & Emerging Brands arm to the main portfolio, with executives seeing potential for growing it to a billion dollar brand.

Now, Coca-Cola is repositioning its tea lineup around its Gold Peak and Peace Tea brands, though it will continue to produce Honest Kids.

"We believe Gold Peak and Peace Tea are best positioned to meet consumer preferences for high-quality brewed teas with different levels of sweetness and flavor," Sabrina Tandon, group director and general manager of Coca-Cola's North America tea portfolio, said in a statement.

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