Consumers are making protein soda at home. The shelf hasn't caught up.

Have you wondered in the past if a soda could do something for you besides tasting good? The answer turned out to be worth billions: PepsiCo paid $1.95 billion for Poppi, while Olipop reached about $400 million in revenue in 2024.

The prebiotic soda market went from nothing to roughly $920 million in about five years, aggregating 2% of the $42.4 billion U.S carbonated soft drink market, by Citi’s estimate.

The useful question now is what people are asking next.

Consumers already answered it

If the wellness era has caught you, you probably have tasted different protein shakes brands and flavors. But the thing is most consumers dislike their taste and texture, reporting bloating, digestion issues and even nausea.

These discomforts open a clear path for protein CSDs (Carbonated Soft Drinks) to grow across the market. Consumers are not waiting for the brands to catch up, as they’re mixing protein powder into sparkling water at home, combining two products that were never designed to go together to build a drinks that solves both the daily protein goal and the discomforts milk-based drinks can cause.

When consumers start improvising a product, they are describing what they would buy if someone made it properly.

The appetite underneath that behavior is measured rather than assumed. RTD high-protein shakes grew from $4.7 billion to $8.1 billion in four years, according to Circana data through 30 November 2025. Accordingly to PwC’s survey, among the 21% of U.S households that now include a GLP-1 user, 35% are buying more packaged protein.

It also stopped belonging only to the gym, as Starbucks now put it into coffee, moving the ingredient to an occasion that has nothing to do with training, stating that protein is now an essential ingredient, creating more demand.

Why the shelf has been slow

Following up the consumers’ assumptions on taste and texture, protein usually makes a drink heavy and cloudy, the opposite of what people expect in a soda, as refreshment is the priority above everything else. A thick, opaque, milky liquide won’t win consumers no matter how good the nutrition panel reads.

Clear protein is what resolves it. It is water-soluble and flavour-neutral, so it works in a light sparkling format without overpowering the drink it sits in. The flavour and the fizz lead; the protein follows.

The industry has been moving that way. Drink launches using whey or clear protein went from 13 globally in 2021 to 117 in the first five months of 2026 alone, according to Mintel GNPD.

Who is trying now

Let’s take a look on the last launches:

C4 Sparkling Protein went carbonated at 20 grams with zero sugar.

Protein Pop Plus reached Costco nationwide.

Mel Robbins put 23 grams into a 3.38-ounce bottle small enough to clear airport security.

Three different answers to the same challenge: a full-size carbonated can, a shelf-stable format built for club retail, and a concentrated shot — which usually means a category is still forming rather than settled. No one has established what the winning format looks like, and that is precisely what makes this moment interesting, for testing it out.

The supply side has barely moved

Here is the number that defines the opportunity:

Carbonated soft drink launches carrying a high or added protein claim were virtually non-existent before 2024. Mintel GNPD counted three globally in 2021, then none at all in 2022 and 2023. Since 2024 the line has moved — seven, then twelve, then thirteen — and in the United States there have been just 10 launches in 2026 so far.

Ten. In a $42.4 billion category, against demand that consumers are already satisfying by hand.

Barebells, Bucked Up and SkyPop are among the first brands staking a claim. Barebells leads with flavour and treats the protein as almost incidental.

Just Ingredients puts "clear protein" on the front of the can to distance itself from whey. Vuum uses a sparkling water base with plant protein and clean caffeine, built for everyday occasions rather than workout recovery.

Different bets, no established winner, and a category still wide open.

Where the window is still open

What the winning version probably looks like

Here’s where the opportunities land:

Lead with flavour: Protein drinks have a taste problem; sodas do not. The flavour should do the work and the protein should follow it.

Moderate the dose: Ten to twenty grams positions the drink for everyday occasions rather than for the gym. Loading it to thirty is a shake mindset applied to a soda, and it brings back the heaviness the format exists to avoid.

Say "clear protein" on the front. It signals a break from whey and from everything consumers associate with it, and people are already using the term.

Design it for life rather than for training. Sleek and understated opens up the office, the afternoon and a night out. Mintel puts it plainly: if you would be embarrassed to drink it in public, rethink it.

Single-serve RTD. No preparation and no mess, which unlocks occasions shakes cannot reach — rehydration and alcohol alternatives among them.

Who can make it, and how to find out

Developing a new product in a still growing category can be challenging, as only few plants can run the formats, but that is more of a problem of identification rather than a mystery.

You can start from contract manufacturers that have already made something similar instead of asking some willing to try. GrowinCo. tracks roughly 80% of new food and beverage launches worldwide and we can help you find the perfect co-manufacturer for your project.

That matters most for timing. Finding the right manufacturer by working through the market on your own takes 12 to 18 months, and a category this early will not stay open that long. The brands that reach shelf first in a forming category are rarely the ones with the best concept, but are the ones who already knew who could make it.

What to do while the format is unsettled

Write the brief a plant can actually answer. That means the format and pack size you have in mind, the process it implies — carbonated or still, hot-fill or cold-fill, shelf-stable or chilled — the consistency you are targeting, and the production parameters that come with all of it: volume, batch size, shelf life, certifications. A sensory description helps a manufacturer understand what you are going for, but the specs are what tell them whether they can run it.

Then mark the specs as fixed or flexible before you send it. Each line you can flex widens the list of plants able to say yes, because a brief with nothing marked flexible reads as all-or-nothing, and that is how a facility that could have worked ends up passing.

Then find out which of them have already made something close to it. That list is shorter than the category makes it look, which is good news once you have it.

Get the 12 questions we would ask a manufacturer before the first conversation →

References:

Mintel, GNPD (2026); PwC, Circana, GrowinCo.