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Comment by vosper | Hacker News Reader

> No one had heard of brands like SodaStream, Fitbit, OtterBox, PopSockets, S’well, Bombas, SimpliSafe and Mrs. Meyers when we embraced and launched them.

I'm a little confused, it sounds like they're taking credit for SodaStream, a company that's more than 100 years old and has been in homes for decades [0]? And Fitbit was only a success because of these people?

Or am I just misunderstanding what they're trying to say here?

[0] Aside: SodaStream is surely ripe for disruption. Home fizzy water is great. Their margin on a tiny bit of CO2 gas must be enormous, surely they're laughing all the way to the bank. How have they maintained their virtual monopoly for so long?

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Re: sodastream I do agree, and I don't particularly like their product. The profit margins of selling canned soda water are incredibly high. Sodastream has managed a virtual monopoly because they appear to have undercut that margin substantially (in that it is much cheaper to do yourself at home than buy soda) and have a very wide distribution network. There's a spot to swap canisters in the small hardware store down the block.

If you were to create a competitor, what would your differentiator be? Cheaper? Good luck, it's already pretty cheap. They're just not worth competing with, it seems.

the problem that sodastream still faces is that you can't get the flavor of e.g. waterloo (for those who don't know: like la croix, but better) at home.

so yeah, the fizz is easy, the flavor not so much. my wife and i do our own blends, but we tried the "essence oils" approach for a bit and gave up.

There already is a competitor. It doesn't take a ton of expertise to attach a regulator and carbonation cap to a co2 tank. Doing it this way, it costs me $20 to get the tank filled, and I can use regular soda bottles.

The next logical step from paying SodaStream for weirdly proprietary CO2 is to simply buy a real tank of CO2 and a bottle-top adapter and make your own. I'm not sure how that could be "disrupted" without carving out a niche for a slightly-more-convenient but equally unnecessary middleman.

I'm basically thinking "the same product as Sodastream, but way cheaper". Like Specsavers did for glasses.

Granted, there may be a little less demand for home fizzy water than there is for good eyesight ;)

It's not like I have a plan to disrupt them, I just hate paying $30NZD for what I know is probably only 30c of gas, if that. I know there are shipping costs, retailer gets a cut etc...

I'm just griping :D

Many Sodastream owners do things like this. Such as hook up a large, commercial CO2 tank, or refill Sodastream tanks with dry ice. Lots of videos on YouTube on this.

As far as I know, it wasn't very big outside Europe until last decade.

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