In 2017, Alessandro Palmarin and Luca Quagliano founded Nio Cocktails. Nio means “requires ice only” because the products are premixed. Simply open the sachet, pour the contents into the glass and add ice. At first, they pocketed 500 a day. Today, they have 50 employees and manufacture 16,000 of them, which they distribute to 20 different countries. Palmarin tells his story to Corriere della Sera of Milan: “The company has a turnover of 7 million euros. The goal is to reach 10 by 2024.” The idea was born like this: “One evening, after a dinner at home during which we had a little excessive drinking, we didn't want to go up to the car to go to a bar. So we tried to make drinks with what we had available. »
The result
The result, however, is disappointing: “While we were trying our hand at cocktails, a friend prepared us a coffee with capsules: hence the lighting. We wondered why there wasn't such an easy way to make high-quality premixed cocktails at home: The year was 2017, and before long we gave up our day job to focus solely on this project. In which they involved a bartender: “Patrick Pistolesi, owner of Drink Kong in Rome, a bar ranked 21st in “The World's 50 Best Bars”, the ranking of the best in the world. The recipes for our drinks are signed by him, it is for us an important guarantee label.” The beginnings were difficult “notably because of the bureaucracy. Then because innovating in the world of food and drinks in Italy is almost impossible, as is conveying the idea that a packaged product is of quality.
Some products
The turning point occurred during the pandemic: “At the start of confinement, we decided to invest our entire budget in the development of e-commerce”. An activity that “will also work in the future. For the packaging, I was inspired by CDs and our dream is that one day everyone can have a library of ready-to-use cocktails at home.” Finally, the price: “Around 6 euros each: they don't have no expiration date because alcohol acts as a natural preservative. You can choose from around twenty classics, from the Negroni to the Cosmopolitan, from the Daiquiri to the Margarita. But we also create collections and special editions with different brands. » But the Spritz is missing. “It is based on Prosecco and the bubbles must be tasted as soon as they are uncorked.”
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