Purity soft drinks is relaunching its flagship juice Burst brand as part of a new strategy to win supermarket listings and double sales.

From mid-February, the brand gets a new look to make it “more relevant” to grocery while the range is being extended to 14 flavours, with three new lines - still lemonade, apple & rhubarb and passion fruit (rsp: £1.29/500ml). The 12-year-old brand, worth £30m in retail sales according to Purity, is currently available from independents and via foodservice.

The changes were part of a five-year strategy announced this week by private equity firm Langholm Capital, which acquired Purity last April and owns brands including Tyrrells crisps. Langholm is aiming to double the company’s £16.1m turnover, and has invested £2.5m in a new plant to increase production by 50%.

Purity’s growth would be driven by Juice Burst, said marketing director Jon Evans, who joined the business last August following a 12-year stint at Britvic, where he was most recently head of the company’s ‘seed’ brands.

“Despite its success in the independent sector and foodservice, where it has experienced strong growth, Juice Burst is something of a hidden gem in the wider market,” he said, adding that the revamped brand would plug a gap in supermarkets for a “competitively priced health-orientated juice”. The company said it was in talks with retailers and hoped for a supermarket roll-out in the first half of this year.

The relaunch is being supported by a social media push targeted at the brand’s core 18 to 24-year-old consumer group, and includes activity with augmented reality app Blippar.

Overall sales of juice drinks have risen 1.6% by volume and 3.8% by value year-on-year [Kantar Worldpanel 52 w/e 25 November 2012].

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