Bye Bye Birdie 2025, Here’s What We Said No To

1. No to Raising Prices (Even When It Hurt)

In September 2025, GOI raised GST rates on non-alcoholic beverages from 18% to 40%, a brutal 22% jump. The obvious move was to pass it on to you, but we didn’t. We absorbed the hit, accepted lower margins, and chose accessibility over profit. We stand the ground that kombucha shouldn’t become a luxury just because policy changed. If you want to know more, read here.

2. No to “Kombucha Must Be Fruity”

Fruit flavours are great. Limiting kombucha to them, not so much. So we went rogue and released Breadwinner, a limited-edition, bread-flavoured kombucha on tap.
Fermentation-forward, wild, strange but damn delicious.

While the industry often leans on syrups and flavourings, we doubled down on craftsmanship and flavour building through real fermentation itself. Because kombucha, like creativity, shouldn’t have limits.

3. No to Staying in Our Lane

We didn’t tiptoe around our boozy buddies. We stood right next to them. From festivals to bars, we showed up loud and clear to say: non-alcoholic isn’t a phase, it’s a movement.

At: The Park, MG Road

4. No to Raves, Yes to Real Conversations

5. No to Treating Kombucha Like a Soft Drink

We approached kombucha the way chefs approach wine. Each brew was tasted for acidity, texture, funk, and finish, then paired with food that could meet it halfway, aged cheeses, toasted sandos, small plates, and generous bites. Some pairings sharpened flavours, others softened edges. All of them revealed what kombucha can do at the table.

After enough tastings (and a lot of eating), we found ourselves with a pairing directory!

6. No to Excelsheet Brewing

Spreadsheets are great. But trusting them alone is not enough. We built our own brewery management system, tracking every brew from tank to bottle, tightening quality control, and letting fermentation do its thing without chaos on the floor.

7. No to Brewing Small Forever

We welcomed new fermentation tanks this year. A serious upgrade.
More room for experiments, scale, and all the strange ideas still brewing. Bringing them up to the 2nd floor is a task, but 11/10 will do it again!

8. No to Not staying curious with kombucha

we set up booch bars, made edible kombucha, stirred sober cocktails, and reimagined what a social drinking space could look like, minus the alcohol, plus the intention.

9. No to Generic Labels

We launched our Mountains of the World inspired labels, a visual love letter to terrain, travel, and the slow craft of fermentation.

10. No to Invisible Presence

We got ourselves a brand-new signboard for the taproom. Because sometimes being seen matters.

11. No to Doing It by the Book

We said no to rigid systems and borrowed playbooks.

Instead, we invested heavily in people, creating room for learning, training, and independent thinking. We built our processes from scratch, stayed flexible, and made space for fun while doing the hard work. Because when people are trusted to think, experiment, and grow, the work gets better. Doing business our way meant not following the crowd and enjoying the process while we were at it.

12. No to Wasting Our SCOBY*

We said no to treating SCOBY* as waste. Instead, we watched it transform into design, from bacterial cellulose to sustainable textile! In collaboration with Srishti College, our SCOBY* became a sustainable material, explored, tested, and reimagined. The result was an iconic light installation, built entirely using our fermented by-product, proving that what’s left behind can still lead the way forward.

The story didn’t stop there. We took upcycled SCOBY* to Echoes of Earth, where it lived a second life as festival décor, raw, tactile, and unmistakably us. From fermentation tank to cultural space, our SCOBY* found a place beyond brewing and thus reducing waste of a wonderful and sustainable resource.

*SCOBY is referred to the pellicle or the bacterial cellulose floating mass that grows on the vessel surface during fermentation process.

12. No to Not Nerding Out

We hung out at Science Gallery as part of the CALORIE exhibition, a space where food fed the tummy as much as it fed thoughts.
The conversations moved across food cultures, agricultural practices, and systems, bringing together voices from different parts of the world to explore how what we eat shapes how we live. We showed up to listen, to exchange, and to place fermentation within a much larger dialogue around food, culture, and the future. 

14. No to “That’s Not Possible”

We executed and delivered full marketing collateral in four hours, from idea to delivery. Fast decisions, deep trust, and a team that knows to move without overthinking. Say hello to our star display!

15. No to Ordinary Festival Participation

We said no to simply showing up.

Instead, we bottled a festival-exclusive flavour, Cacao Creamsicle for The Indian Cacao and Craft Chocolate Festival, then made our debut at our favourite sustainable music festival, Echoes of Earth with kombucha on-tap, refilling festival mugs! 

From food-first spaces to culture-led stages, we showed up with intention, proving once again that good kombucha belongs everywhere food and culture exist.