Brand for thechallengers.
I’m Allie. Fifteen years building marketing, comms, and brand for founder-led drinks and challenger businesses. And for the VCs and funds backing them.
Free 30-minute intro. For founders, or for funds.
- New York Times
- Financial Times
- Forbes
- The Economist
The brands that last are the ones that changed their category.
I’ve spent fifteen years building for them.
Hospitality. Non-alc. New World whiskey. Agave. My career has followed the challengers — the founders and brands who looked at a drinks industry three centuries deep and decided to take it somewhere new. Working with them has been the best part of fifteen years of work. This is what that pattern looks like in practice.
Four focus areas. One operating pattern.
Applied to founders, to funds, and to the corporates that back both. Engagements scale from a 30-minute call to a quarterly retainer.
The communications work behind launches, announcements, acquisitions, and the moments that catch a business off guard — the words, rooms, and press relationships that carry the story through.
Positioning, story, launch, and the category platforms that turn a good drinks product into a reference point in its space. The brand work founders rely on when the product is ready but the market still needs the map.
Fund positioning, thought leadership, and the LP and GP narratives that turn a fund's credibility into founder inbound — instead of waiting for the right deal to find you.
White papers, reports, trade narratives, and the category arguments the market can repeat after you. Proof that travels from LinkedIn to a buyer's desk and keeps showing up where it matters.
Fifteen years of brand,
nine of them at Distill Ventures.
Distill Ventures
The accelerator founder-led drinks brands wanted to be part of.
Nine years building the brand, marketing, and comms engine at Diageo-backed DV. Brand Manager to Director. Over £320M invested across 35+ founder-led drinks and CPG brands.
Seedlip and Mr. Black
Two category-defining founder exits, landed in the press.
Announcement comms for two of the most-watched exits in the Diageo portfolio. Founder briefings, market-making press kits, and the post-deal narrative.
Non-Alc + Wellness
Turning a fringe bet into a mainstream category.
The white paper, data-led press, and founder community behind the breakout brands that defined non-alc and drinks-adjacent wellness.
New World Whiskey
A white paper that moved the industry.
Framed, researched, and launched DV's flagship thought leadership. The piece founders quoted in their decks for years afterward.
DV Global Rebrand
New identity, new voice, new digital ecosystem.
Led the global rebrand of Distill Ventures. Visual, verbal, web, social, and the channels that carried the story to the founder market.
The reputation worth earning.
I did my research, and they just kept coming up. By the time I reached out, it felt like a natural fit. For an early founder, that kind of visibility and credibility made all the difference.
Their reputation in the industry was unmatched, and it was clear they had earned real trust from founders. That gave us the confidence that they were the right partner.