IF you take a look at Oatside’s web site (www.oatside.com), you’ll perceive it as a brand for Gen Z. The web site shows Oatside’s unique colorful and cartoony branding with the bear at the center of it. Another feature of the Oatside branding is what they call “Bearisms.”
One Bearism states: “Dress for the job you want, not the one you have, which is why I wear sweatpants to the office so they know I want to be a remote employee.”
But the Singaporean brand’s colorful persona, which extends to the packaging, is meant to speak to everyone, including children and older adults.
Oatside was launched in December 2021. It is not the first oat milk brand in the market but it’s currently the top oat milk brand in Asia, excluding China, a market it has just entered.
“We’ve really grown the category since the start of last year. We’ve launched across 15 countries and we started in China just three months ago,” said Lim at the sidelines of Oatside’s formal launch in the Philippines.
In September 2022, Oatside announced the closing of a $65.5m Series A funding round to expand its production output across Singapore and the greater Asia-Pacific region. The funding was led by Temasek Holdings, GGV Capital, and Arabica International.
Video creator Erwan Heussaff, who was present at the launch, said Lim created not the best tasting non-dairy milk but “the best-tasting milk that you can have.”
“If you try it, you get a lot of the maltiness, the nuttiness, the creaminess that we as Filipinos absolutely adore. If you take a step further, the texture. Texture is very important. The texture is so strong. We’ve tried other plant-based milks and it’s watery, it separates. There’s always something, whereas with Oatside’s oat milk, you really feel that it’s a complete product that is really well-made,” said Heussaff, who has been drinking non-dairy milk for years and considers Oatside the best.
Lim started to develop Oatside oat milk during the pandemic.
“I was locked down at home and I had a lot of time in my hands. I started ordering oats from different countries—from Sweden, from Finland, from Australia—and really testing these at home. I found that oats from Australia were a little bit nutty and the others were more grassy. Personally, I like the Australian oats because it’s nutty and well-rounded so we decided to go with that,” said Lim.
He explained that he chose oats because it is a grain that contains starch so it has more body and texture. The starch gives the product a natural creaminess.
Oatside is also sustainable across the entire supply chain. It has three times less carbon emissions, 11 times less land use, and 13 times less water consumption. Oatside also installed natural gas boilers instead of cheap gas boilers in its factory to reduce carbon emissions even further.
Oatside, which is Singapore’s first oat milk brand, is produced in Bandung, West Java, Indonesia. Oatside is also a full-stack brand, meaning company has control over every step of the manufacturing process, from the ingredient sourcing to production.
Consumers like Oatside because of the taste. I, for one, have always thought that oat milk was for adding to coffee but Oatside can actually be enjoyed alone or even with cereal. You can also use oat milk for sauces that need milk, including béchamel sauce. One more thing that consumers like about Oatside is its affordability. It costs way less than other brands in the market.
Oatside, which comes in Barista Blend, Chocolate, and Chocolate Hazelnut, is available in the Philippines on Lazada and Shopee, and at Landers, Puregold, The Landmark, and Coop Grocer.
Image credits: Juliana Maxine Vasquez
