How Honest Kids Is Reinventing a Lunchbox Staple

When it comes to cash, marketers know kids are a sure thing. It’s no coincidence that TV is full of friendly leprechauns pitching marshmallow-filled cereal and cartoon mascots telling kids to drink sugar-filled sodas.

But there are good guys out there. Honest Kids, a spinoff of Honest Tea, has been changing the game since their launch in 2007 with drinks that give kids the flavor they want—without all of the sugar and preservatives.

In 2013, Honest Kids removed all the organic cane juice from their recipes, so all of their juices are sweetened only with fruit juice. That means Honest Kids beverages only contain about half the sweetener of many other kids juice drinks.

Honest was founded by Seth Goldman and Barry Nalebuff in 1998. with a mission to bottle a better beverage—super flavorful, but not super sweet.

The Honest Kids line launched as a tribute to the founders’ children, Elie and Zoe. The back of each package even carries a message from the kids: “The drinks taste great, and because they’re not too sweet and there’s no fake stuff, your parents will like buying them as much as we like drinking them.”

Here’s how it works: After you collect a few drink pouches, just download  a free shipping label and send them to TerraCycle. The upcycling company will turn your used juice pouches into bags or other products, keeping the waste out of landfills and gets another use out of old drink pouches.

Since the brigade started in 2007, TerraCycle has collected more than 234 million drink pouches. That adds up to more than 2 million pounds of waste that would have ended up in landfills.

Plus, every time you recycle a drink pouch, you earn TerraCycle points. These points add up, and you can redeem them for a cash donation to a nonprofit, school, or charity. Through TerraCycle, consumers have donated about $4.5 million so far.

Kids love the taste, parents love the ingredients, and the planet doesn’t suffer. Ok, Honest Kids—we’ll drink to that.

Photo credit: Paul Delmont