Sarasota family's product gaining attention

SARASOTA - Denise Chu grew up in Boston and — naturally — is a Red Sox fan. So when her son’s friend called and told her to turn on the Yankees game, she thought he was giving her a hard time. Finally she turned on the game and there in the dugout, Chu saw what he was so excited about. There it was: a bottle of EQ Thirst Equalizer, sitting behind one of the team managers. Suddenly the Chu household realized they had hit a home run with their Hurricane Juice Co.

For the past three years now the family has taken to the road to sell Ozzie Chu’s invention, an all-natural sports drink made from the water in young coconuts and a mix of citrus juices.

Finally it seems, with their bottles on shelves in Whole Foods, the Granary, Sweetbay and Hannaford supermarkets, they are on their way to making a profit.

The Chus are even meeting with Major League Baseball trainers to sell their product. The trainer with the Toronto Blue Jays already has the Hurricane Juice, Co.’s products delivered regularly.

Then there are the minor roles — as a sort of Beverage Extra — their sports drink has had on sitcoms such as “The Big Bang Theory” on CBS, and upcoming episodes of Lifetime’s new show “Rita Rocks” and the CW network’s new drama “Privileged.”

All of it has added up to big time exposure for the small Sarasota company.

An up-and-coming business, Hurricane is scheduled to be featured in articles in four trade magazines in the coming months and has already received positive reviews (four out of five stars) from BevNet, a trade publication specializing in beverage news and reviews.

In its review of the all-natural sports drink, the publication said: “EQ Thirst Equalizer, is the next step in the evolution of the modern sports drink that fits perfectly with today’s active lifestyle.”

The idea

Ozzie Chu, a food science expert who graduated 25 years ago from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, had been in research and development for Tropicana Products in Bradenton for about a dozen years when the parent company, PepsiCo, decided to move the division’s corporate headquarters, including Chu’s department, to Chicago.

The Chus’ three children were in school, and the family loved the area and did not want to move.

Ozzie and Denise had discussed starting their own beverage business and had even worked on recipes for an all-natural sports drink, bringing in Sarasota High School and Cardinal Mooney High School students to perform taste tests.

While the sports drink seemed to be a hit with the students, the Chus were still nervous about going out on their own in such a risky and expensive venture.

So Ozzie Chu commuted for a year between Chicago and Sarasota while working out how the family would survive if he quit his job and worked on his business full time.

When he talked to friends about his idea, he got tremendous support. And then a group of his friends, including a vice president at Fidelity Investments, decided it was time to give him a little push. They formed a board of directors, named the company Hurricane Juice, and suddenly Chu was in business.

His partners’ expertise in business and marketing gave him the confidence he needed to go out on his own.

Ozzie Chu gave up his job at Tropicana and recruited his wife and sons, and they went to work selling his ideas and helping him develop new flavors.

They launched the EQ Thirst Equalizer product line in January 2007. They hope the company will turn a profit next year.

The formula

Chu grew up in Panama where drinking coconut water was typical, especially after working outside or participating in sports. Panamanians knew that coconut water was quick to hydrate, it was refreshing and it was available everywhere.

In addition, coconut water contains high levels of potassium — great for athletes and anyone who suffers from muscle cramps. The coconut water also contains vitamin C and calcium.

For Chu, who developed a fascination for science as a kid, it was a natural choice as the basis of a sports drink.

Chu earned a chemistry degree as an undergraduate student at the University of Panama. Toward the end of his undergraduate career, he got interested in biochemistry and applied food chemistry, and decided to continue graduate studies.

Because none of the universities in Panama offered graduate education in those fields at that time, Chu decided to apply to schools abroad and was accepted into MIT.

After graduating from the University of Panama, he worked as a chemist at the U.S. Army Tropic Test Center in Panama for about a year, saving his money so that he could move to Boston and earn a master’s degree in food science and technology.

Chu developed his expertise in food processing while working in biotech and later in food processing research for dairy, beer and juice companies.

Over the years Chu developed various methods of adding food acids to coconut water so that it could be pasteurized at lower temperatures to preserve the water’s flavors. He has at least five patents in food processing technology and has applications in for several more.

A few years ago, he developed his all-natural drink made of 90 percent coconut water and includes citric acid, cane sugar and other natural flavors. Since then he has been perfecting the recipe, using Sarasota’s high school athletes — all friends of his children — as taste-testers.

Chu hit the all-natural trend at just the right time. His sports drink came to market as the foods trend was rising in popularity.

Currently, Hurricane is producing nearly 400,000 bottles a year or about 2,500 cases every month. A company in the Midwest is bottling the product and the Chus are negotiating with a Tampa bottling company to have at least some of the inventory bottled closer to home.

The Chus, who are on the road regularly, give away as much as they can afford to, to get people to try it. But sales have been climbing at health food stores and at Whole Foods Markets. As demand increases, they will have to increase production.

The sports drink is the perfect fit for Whole Foods, said Russ Benblatt, regional marketing director for Whole Foods Market. The company, which sells EQ in most of its Florida stores, liked that the beverage was produced locally and that it met Whole Foods strict standards.

“All the food in our stores is natural,” Benblatt said. “There are no artificial coloring or flavorings in any of the products we sell. We’ve been natural for almost 30 years, and our standards are pretty far above any grocery store for natural products.”

Getting the word out

The Chus were neither marketing or business experts when they started their business, but in two years they have learned a lot.

They have flown all over the country promoting their product at food and beverage shows. They have fostered friendships and found volunteers to help them get the word out at the trade shows, at colleges and at sporting events.

Early on, Ozzie Chu partnered with the Sarasota Marathon, handing his drinks out to the thirsty runners as they competed. Hurricane sponsored a Doug Flutie Foundation’s 5K race in Massachusetts to benefit childhood autism research.

Anywhere they can find a crowd of likely sports drink users, the Chus try to get there.

The two older Chu children are working in the business. Jonathan Chu, 22, graduated from the University of South Florida with a communications degree and is out marketing the drink to grocery store managers, college students and anyone who will give it a try.

Ryan, 20, is a student at the University of Central Florida, and works part time marketing the drink on campus and around the Orlando area.

Hurricane Juice’s board members have connections to the sports world and to people in Hollywood, and they have helped the Chus with both the marketing and the business side of the beverage industry.

Every connection seems to lead to a new one.

It is how the trainer for the Toronto Blue Jays discovered EQ. It also is how the drink ended up in the Yankees dugout during a televised game.

Connections are the way the drink ended up on TV shows. One of the board members for Hurricane Juice had a connection with Mario Lopez, the American actor who has been in several TV series, film and performed on Broadway. The board member sent a few cases of the sports drink to the studios where Lopez works, and it was a hit.

Hurricane has a spot on its Web site to get feedback on the sport drinks, and the Chus read every e-mail they receive.

“We have a lot of ground to cover,” Ozzie Chu said. “It’s a challenge with all of those other products out there.”

Even with all of their success, Ozzie and Denise Chu still find it scary that they do not have a regular paycheck to fall back on.

“It’s never the right time to go out on your own,” Denise Chu said, noting that supporters understood Ozzie Chu’s training. “The people who encouraged us are good, good friends. They know his education and believe in us and took a chance with us.”