In 2015, Allison Ellsworth was in her kitchen experimenting with different gut-healthy drink recipes, trying to make apple cider vinegar taste good. Little did she know that the concoctions she was mixing would eventually become a billion-dollar business.
Today, the 38-year-old is the co-founder of the prebiotic soda brand Poppi, which she started alongside her husband, Stephen Ellsworth. Almost a decade after her kitchen experiments, in May 2025, Ellsworth sold the business to PepsiCo for $1.95 billion. The deal includes $300 million in anticipated cash tax benefits for a net purchase price of $1.65 billion.
### Entrepreneur by Nature
Ellsworth has always been a hustler. “I just knew I never wanted to work for anyone. I was good at, like, hacking systems and… I always had this really great gift to be visionary [and] see through cracks,” Ellsworth told CNBC Make It.
While in college, she took a full year off to travel and still managed to graduate in four years. During her studies, she also worked several jobs where she figured out how to execute more efficiently than expected.
“I worked at a call center, and I learned really early working there, that if I did certain things, I could double, triple, 5x the sales of everybody else,” Ellsworth said.
### From Oil and Gas Research to Healthy Living
After college, Ellsworth spent years on the road working in oil and gas research. She traveled all around the United States by herself, which eventually began to weigh on her health.
“I did that for seven years, working all over the U.S. I’ve driven through every single state by myself, stayed in teeny, little towns and motels and ran huge, multi-million dollar projects in my 20s. It was crazy,” she said.
Since she was always on the road, she had trouble accessing nutritious food. “I felt ill. So my face started breaking out, my stomach was hurting. I was allergic to all sorts of different things,” she revealed.
### A Love for Apple Cider Vinegar
“I just fell in love with apple cider vinegar, and the way it made me feel, but I wanted to make it taste better,” said Allison Ellsworth, co-founder and Chief Brand Officer of Poppi.
Her passion for gut health and desire to create a tasty, healthful beverage ultimately led to the birth of Poppi—a brand that has transformed how people enjoy prebiotic soda.
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https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/17/poppi-went-from-kitchen-experiment-to-2-billion-deal-with-pepsico.html