Huseyin Kaplan

Huseyin KaplanAug 4, 2026

Excited to share that Hashtag Collabz has been selected for The Foundry with Foundervine, Molten Ventures & Esprit Foundation! Over the next 12 weeks, we’ll be focused on having even more traction!

Huseyin KaplanJul 27, 2026

Last year, TRIP raised at a $300M valuation. The drink was never the moat. Here's the story. In 2019, a wife and a husband left careers in law and finance to start a drinks brand. Daniel Khoury had knee surgery right before their wedding. Olivia Ferdi CBD helped him recover. That was the spark. They started with CBD drinks. It worked fast. They became known as "the Queen's CBD" after selling out at the Windsor shop. Soho House put them in houses around the world. Then they made the smart move. CBD was a regulatory headache. So they pivoted. Magnesium drinks. Electrolytes. Gummies. They stopped selling an ingredient. They started selling a feeling: calm. The numbers today: → $40M raised, $300M valuation → ~£75M revenue, forecast to more than double → Profitable → 10,000 US stores, 50,000 globally → Most valuable UK drinks brand since Innocent and Fever-Tree But here's the part I keep coming back to. A magnesium drink isn't defensible. Anyone can make one. So how did TRIP actually grow? Influencer marketing and UGC. Everywhere. Their socials, their ads, their whole presence is built on creators and real people, not polished brand films. Half a billion social impressions in a single year. Then look at who backed the round. Joe Jonas. Alessandra Ambrosio. Ashley Graham. Paul Wesley. That's not just a cap table. That's a standalone distribution network. The formula can be copied. The community can't. Most DTC brands can't put Joe Jonas on their cap table. But every brand can build a network of creators that makes them impossible to ignore. And I'd put money on TRIP raising again this year. I'm genuinely excited to see what they do with it. P.S. Elderflower Mint is the best flavour. I won't be taking questions.

Huseyin KaplanJul 28, 2026

In 2011, David Abrahamovitch inherited his father's phone shop. He turned it into a coffee shop, Grind ; Today that "side hustle" is worth £147.5M. The first Grind opened in Shoreditch. Coffee by day. Cocktails by night. One space, doing the work of two. For 10 years, they built a £10M café business. Slow. Physical. Location by location. Then 2020 hit. The cafés went dark. So they did something most coffee chains didn't. They put their coffee in a pink tin. And shipped it straight to your kitchen. The result? They rebuilt the whole business online, in 10 months. Direct-to-consumer went from 5% of revenue to 50%. Today: → £35.3M in revenue → A Grind coffee sold every 2.8 seconds → £147.5M valuation They're still losing money. Investors valued them at £147.5M anyway. Because they're not betting on the coffee. Here's the thing. Grind's real product was never the coffee. It was a pink tin you couldn't stop photographing. Every kitchen counter became a billboard. Every customer became a creator. Even with just a handful of cafés, their following beat brands like Pret, Byron and Pizza Express. The only question that matters is who's holding the tin. ps. this is my 1kg Grind coffee beans in my living room.