There’s a new CFO at Liquid Death, a beverage brand with a cool factor that reaches young—and very often “sober-curious”—consumers.
Karim Sadik-Khan, the company’s new finance chief, has followed the evolution of Liquid Death for several years. “It’s a new brand-building model, and that’s what really pulled me in,” Sadik-Khan told Fortune in an interview on Tuesday. “It connects with consumers—especially millennials and Gen Z.”
Contrary to its name, Liquid Death, founded in 2017, is popular nonalcoholic brand. The beverages in its edgy aluminum cans are either water, sparkling water, or iced tea with fruit juice and agave sweetener. In 2023, the startup hit $263 million in retail-scanned sales through registers and expanded to 113,000 retail locations across the U.S. and U.K. The company is valued at $1.4 billion.
“Liquid Death is a funny brand,” CEO and founder Mike Cessario recently told Fortune. “We don’t actually take ourselves seriously. We don’t think we’re extreme. We’re kind of making fun of all that extreme marketing.” (Sadik-Khan said Cessario’s goal of building a sustainable brand that’s anti-plastic and promoting a healthy lifestyle also attracted him to the firm.)
Most recently, Sadik-Khan was the CFO for spirits provider Beam Suntory (BSI) North America. He held several financial leadership roles in his 14 years with the company, including during Jim Beam’s IPO in 2011 and the acquisition of Jim Beam by Suntory in 2014. Before BSI, Sadik-Khan held roles at PepsiCo, Dr Pepper–Snapple (now Keurig–Dr Pepper), and IBM.
With nearly two decades in the beverage industry, Sadik-Khan has seen many brands spend millions of dollars on digital advertising for products that ultimately failed. “People just click past and skip the ad, and pay no attention to it,” he said. Liquid Death generates “such high-quality content that is so cool and relevant with young consumers” that bigger brands want to work with the company.
Liquid Death has announced a partnership with NASCAR, a contest to win an aircraft, and had a recent collaboration with e.l.f. Cosmetics with makeup kits that sold out in 45 minutes. Sadik-Khan said his 15-year-old daughter texted him that day and told him: “I tried to buy one of the kits, and they’re already sold out.”
Liquid Death also has a strong social media following—more than 8.9 million followers across TikTok and Instagram. The strides made by the company with Gen Zers could can be at least partially attributed to the group drinking less alcohol than older generations.
According to NCSolutions’ latest consumer sentiment survey, about 61% of Gen Zers (born 1997 to 2002) said they planned to cut back on their alcohol consumption in 2024, compared with 40% who said that for 2023.
“I would say everyone in the alcohol industry is aware of that movement, and Gen Z is the most sober generation ever,” Sadik-Khan said. “This is a real movement. It’s based on health and wellness, with people prioritizing their mental and physical well-being.”
