The company behind "healthier boba" is ... doing less than great right now

[therearewords]

Simu Liu Accuses Boba Brand of ‘Culture Appropriation’ in Viral Dragons' Den Clip - Then $1M Investment Is Pulled https://t.co/WTzbP51pvY
- People (@people) October 17, 2024

- In case you missed what this is the follow-up to- Bobba’s Instagram page posted a statement on Oct. 14 and apologized for the controversial business pitch. The six-part

Comments

[yurasama_love]

Fucking good. I don't need some white people telling me I don't know what mystery ingredients are in boba. Fuck off.

[xpirate_queenx]

lmao

[anthknee]

Good

[ginainabottle]

I’ve never had bobba but I’d try the OG one before even touching the supposedly improved new version. I don’t mind reinvented versions of foreign food - lord knows I adore the atrocities they make with sushi here in Brazil - but the audacity of claiming as a fact that you’re making it better but doing whatever your culture deems relevant/tastier is just beyond.

[silverstarry]

These fools weren't even changing a boba drink to adapt it to their culture. Everything shown in their pitch that they claimed was innovative, original, and disrupting the current boba industry (fruit juice, popping boba, prepackaged boba drinks that can be sold at grocery stores instead of made fresh) has all been done for years. The nerve to claim that they were improving boba by inventing new options when they were just repackaging the same old stuff almost made me laugh (except for the part where it was infuriating).

[ginainabottle]

WTF they weren’t even trying anything new? I thought they were adding stuff americans can’t live without like bacon or neon yellow cheese or something lol

[therearewords]

Not bacon!

[blazingeternity]

"Water • Sugars (fructose, strawberry juice, strawberry juice concentrate) • Oligofructose • Starch acetate • Natural and artificial flavors • Matcha powder • Calcium lactate • Calcium chloride • Lemon juice concentrate • Citric acid • Malic acid • Sodium alginate • Potassium sorbate • Xanthan gum • Sodium erythorbate • Allura red • Sodium carboxymethyl cellulose." - that's a whole lotta stuff for a ~healthy alternative when, as others have commented already, the original drink can easily be made with 3 or 4 ingredients and no artificial flavouring.
Yeah, of course, a storable pre-packaged drink will need stabilizers and preservatives, and they're apparently only thinking of those neon fruit variants instead of the classic boba tea, but that's still... a lot of sugar and acids; and "artificial flavours" & allura red (an Azo dye, which there are ongoing research & concerns about in the EU) gets a bombastic side-eye from me. imo if you want an artificial soda-style drink, accept the nutritional consequences and just drink it; stop