GateDrop, a new energy gummy brand inspired by motocross and action sports culture and built for motion, is setting its sights on disrupting the booming energy drink category. Driven by its go-to-market strategy, what the brand calls CPG 2.0, GateDrop aims to deliver a better-for-you, portable alternative to traditional energy drinks, in gummy form. 

We recently touched base with Co-founder and CEO Tim Near to chat about his inspiration for the brand and what's next on the horizon.

Liz Parker Kuhn: What made you want to create an energy gummy brand?

Tim Near: GateDrop started as a result of a real life need for flexible energy, and no existing solution in the market felt right for our usage occasions. My co-founder Kyle and I began brewing and microdosing concentrated cold brew before workouts as a way to get clean, controlled energy. 

That exercise helped us realize the right way to microdose wasn’t a liquid at all, and that led us to gummies as the ideal format. They are portable, precise, and flexible. You can enjoy them however fits the moment, whether at small deliveries or stacking them to replace any type of energy product with ease.

There's so much excitement about the caffeinated gummy segment now, but we've been planning our launch for years. We began researching the concept in 2023, moved into planning in 2024, and spent 2025 developing and refining the product. We're proud to be a brand who was deeply thoughtful about the ingredients, dosing, and flavor development. All of that diligence on the frontend will help us become a leader in the energy gummy space, and help the category take hold more broadly.

Just like RTD energy beverages expanded the caffeine market over the last 20 years, we believe the combination of expanded usage occasions, improved user control, and better product economics makes energy gummies a category that can both take share and grow the overall CPG energy market.

Once you've tried GateDrop, you start to rethink how you use energy products entirely, because the flexibility of the product gives you so much more flexibility and control. We're really rethinking the entire energy experience from the ground up.

LPK: The name is unique—can you expand on why you chose that name?

TN: GateDrop is named after the start of a motocross race, the "gate drop moment": physically that means that the gate drops down, allowing all of the bikes to start moving. Metaphorically, it’s the single second where all of your preparation meets the opportunity to win.

While this moment and its importance is derived from motocross, it's not exclusive to it at all. It’s really a universal feeling of focus, anticipation, readiness, and adrenaline that resonates with anyone stepping into something that matters. Being ready to take it on and capture your chance to win, whatever winning looks like to you.

That feeling is exactly what we wanted to capture in the product. It’s not just about caffeine—it’s about performance, readiness, and being able to go when it matters most. The name also reflects our roots, as both Kyle and I grew up in motocross and built the brand inspired by that culture and community.

LPK: How did you use your experience at Red Bull, Mtn Dew, Vitaminwater, and Clif Bar to help you with this new brand?

TN: I’m a serial entrepreneur at heart, and my co-founder, Kyle, has an operational business mindset. To round out the team, we assembled a leadership team with deep experience across global CPG, lifestyle, and performance brands. For example, our CMO has worked with top consumer brands such as Google, Meta, X-Games and VF’s house of brands while our head of partnerships has worked at brands like Red Bull and Clif Bar—to name just a few. Our team really represents the perfect mix of entrepreneurship and seasoned CPG experts. 

Business experience aside, we are all native New Englanders and at our core we are all super passionate about the outdoors and taking on new adventures at any turn.

My family background has also significantly influenced GateDrop, as I come from a family of CPG pioneers and food scientists. This has definitely helped shape our focus on precise, clean formulation, and innovation. I was inspired by my grandmother who was an Italian immigrant restaurant owner and chef, and my grandfather who was a food scientist and CPG innovator. My mother had a tea shop in honor of my grandfather, whose work involved precise caffeine formulation, which is another caffeine connection that now fuels our work at GateDrop. 

LPK: How did you choose the amount of caffeine per gummy, and did you do consumer taste testing?

TN: We were extremely intentional about dosing. Each gummy is designed to deliver a precise, microdosed amount of caffeine so consumers can control their intake—rather than being locked into a single high-dose serving. On the flip side, we wanted the dose high enough to be stackable with 4–6 gummies. In our discovery and consumer testing, 25 mg really ended up being a sweet spot. That flexibility and adaptability are a big part of what sets us apart.

We spent nearly two years in development, balancing ingredient purity, efficacy, and taste profile. There were extensive iterations to ensure the gummies delivered clean energy without the crash, while still tasting great. We made a decision to use natural caffeine from green coffee over synthetic caffeine anhydrous, despite the fact that the natural caffeine had a more difficult taste to mask. In order to overcome this, we developed a number of proprietary bitter masking technologies. The solutions we've developed are so effective, they allow us to deliver more caffeine in half of the gummies versus others in the market (four for GateDrop versus eight for competitors to reach the same 100 mg of caffeine).

As an engineer by trade and heart, testing is at the root of everything we do. As we bring GateDrop to market, we have tested with consumers along the whole journey. Much like all of GateDrop, our consumer testing is built on the principles of nimble, transparent, and understanding our customer and consumer. We validated at every step: brand, ingredients, taste, packaging, and user experience. We conducted testing of GateDrop at the gym, in offices, at hospitals to staff, at action sport events, in the pit at motocross races, traveling across the country, climbing the top of local mountains in the middle of winter, and much more.

LPK: What flavors have already been released, and do you have expansion plans this year, too?

TN: To start, we really wanted to focus on perfecting our Mixed Berry flavor profile using natural ingredients—make it approachable with a perfect balance of sweetness.

In the future, we absolutely see both sugar-free variants and flavor expansion as a key lever for growth. That includes both new core flavors and limited releases that tap into our action sports roots and community partnerships.

We’ve also been thoughtful about the balance of flavor and responsible consumption. The goal is to make our gummies delicious, while also making it be clear to the consumer that this is a functional product designed for a specific purpose. Internally we always use the expression "tool not candy," and that's a guide for all decisions we make about the product. For instance, we didn't even want the product to look like candy, which helped us make a decision to coat in tapioca starch instead of sugar.

LPK: The product is currently available at Alltown Fresh stores—any plans on expanding, and if so, which stores?

TN: Alltown Fresh has been a great launch partner for us, especially given their footprint across the Northeast and our home state of New Hampshire—as well as their alignment with a discerning, on-the-go consumer.

From here, the focus is on strategic expansion—particularly in convenience stores, specialty retail, and locations that over-index with our core consumer. We see a lot of opportunity in c-store, outdoor, and action sports-adjacent retail as we continue to scale. The initial placements reflect retailer interest in alternative energy formats.

Of course our long-term goal is to be in every store across the country. We also recognize our fans also often are not near a convenience store so we have a convenient subscription service online as well. Our goal is to be wherever consumers are looking for better-for-you energy!

LPK: What is your favorite GateDrop flavor to enjoy?

TN: We launched with our Mixed Berry, since it was the overwhelmingly favorite flavor for our team as well as the consumers who sampled. We’re currently working on perfecting a few other flavors which we’re excited to unveil in the second half of this year with some of our athletes and channel partners.

GateDrop's flavors will always be rooted in real world ingredients. For instance, the reason why we decided not to make a blue raspberry flavor is because there is no such thing as a blue raspberry.

We have a commitment to our customers for transparency and ingredient quality. You'll see that in every decision we make going forward.

Related: GateDrop Energy Gummies prepare to launch