A Quirky Flavored-Water Brand Tries to Grow Up<br />“It wasn’t meant to live beyond that.”<br />“They were one of the bigger winners in the Super Bowl,” said Ted Marzilli, the chief executive of YouGov BrandIndex, which found<br />that Bai’s ranking in two out of three perception categories it measures rose significantly after the commercial aired.<br />“To say ‘bye-bye’ to sugar is very functional and very focused on our core Bai<br />product,” Mr. Portas said, a focus experts say could serve the brand well<br />For the 2017 Super Bowl, Bai’s in-house creative team developed a commercial featuring Mr. Walken<br />reciting lines from the hit NSync song “Bye, Bye, Bye” as Mr. Timberlake looked on quizzically.<br />“We have a funny, irreverent, silly personality, but we also have a serious side.”<br />A niche player in the flavored-water beverage category, Bai caught the attention<br />of the singer Justin Timberlake and the Dr Pepper Snapple Group last year.<br />After the studied zaniness of a campaign with the tag line “None of this makes sense” — a reference to how a five-calorie antioxidant<br />drink could still manage to taste good — Bai Brands is looking to cast itself in a mature, inspirational image.
