Clean Simple Eats (CSE) has placed its Frosted Lemonade Clear Protein Soda in 100 Costco locations across the Southwest region, with the product available simultaneously on costco.com. The brand is slotted in the Protein Department rather than the traditional beverage aisle — a positioning decision that signals where Costco buyers are betting on incremental volume and where better-for-you brands are winning shelf real estate that legacy soda SKUs used to own.
The club channel has become a proving ground for functional beverage brands with strong DTC foundations. Costco's buying cadence rewards brands that can demonstrate velocity data before the pitch meeting, and CSE's e-commerce history as a direct seller gave it exactly that kind of pre-qualified demand signal. For operators and suppliers watching the functional beverage space, this placement reflects a broader pattern: club buyers are accepting permissioned introductions from brands that have already built an audience, rather than waiting for them to earn it through conventional grocery.
From a brand launch and distribution standpoint, the Protein Department slot is tactically smart. It reduces direct competition with established carbonated soft drinks and positions Clear Protein Soda alongside products where the consumer is already willing to spend a premium. Brands entering club retail for the first time should note that Costco's regional rollout structure — Southwest first — is standard risk mitigation, but it also compresses the window in which a brand needs to prove turns. If velocity holds over the next two quarters, a national expansion conversation typically follows.
For buyers, brokers, and brand consultants advising clients on club-channel entry, the CSE playbook is worth studying: a differentiated format (clear protein in a carbonated format), a hero SKU with proven DTC demand, and a department placement that sidesteps category crowding. The timing also aligns with sustained consumer interest in protein-forward functional beverages — a segment that has consistently outperformed conventional beverage categories in scan data over the past 18 months. Operators building retail-ready brands or advising on distributor introductions should treat this as a benchmark for what a credible club pitch looks like in the current buyer environment.
If your brand is building toward a similar retail moment, the groundwork is laid well before the buyer deck — in SKU rationalization, packaging compliance, and the kind of velocity narrative that makes a regional test an easy yes.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
