When Gerry Scullion was made redundant in 2012, it gave him an opportunity to pursue his interest in fermenting and brewing. He decided he’d like to develop healthy fermented non-alcoholic drinks.
This was drawn from his own experience, because whenever he wanted a soft drink in a pub, he was limited to high-sugar brands, full of artificial flavours. Working from home, Gerry found he could make a delicious drink from a culture called Water Kefir, which has the added benefit of containing gut friendly cultures. His next step was to open a small production facility in The Chocolate Factory (a shared area for creatives and start-ups in Dublin).
Gerry is interested in ‘a new drinking culture’, changing people’s views and offering them a tempting, healthy, soft-drink alternative, full of beneficial bacteria and yeast.
Keith set up a studio in the same building as Gerry, the Chocolate Factory Arts Centre, to make hand-crafted artisan lighting in 2014. When Gerry needed help bottling one of his early batches of lemongrass and ginger in his development kitchen, Keith stepped up. As the production of King of Kefir drinks grew, Keith worked more and more with Gerry on the filling operations and contributed immensely to the successful production of the drinks. He is now a partner in the business.
Water kefir is a live culture fermented beverage which is teeming with beneficial and gut friendly bacteria and yeast.
We use organic ingredients and our drinks are very lightly sweetened using a tea infusion from stevia plant leaves.
Each bottle takes 14 days to fizz up before it is ready to be enjoyed, as they carbonate through a natural process called bottle conditioning.
Our drinks are gluten free and dairy free, vegan and are suitable diabetics.