Reed’s Taps Veteran Neal Cohane as COO in High-Stakes Turnaround Bid

NORWALK, Conn. – December 29, 2025 – In a strategic move signaling a determined push for a corporate revival, natural beverage maker Reed’s, Inc. announced today it is bringing back a familiar face to its executive suite. Neal Cohane, a beverage industry heavyweight who previously spent 15 years as the company’s sales chief, will rejoin as Chief Operating Officer, effective January 5, 2026.

The appointment comes at a critical juncture for the owner of the Reed's®, Virgil's®, and Flying Cauldron® brands. The company, a pioneer in the craft soda space, is grappling with significant financial pressures, and Cohane’s return is being positioned as a key component of its strategy to navigate a turbulent market and engineer a return to sustainable growth. He is tasked with leading the sales, marketing, and operations functions, a broad mandate that underscores the urgency of the company’s situation.

A Prodigal Son Returns to a Troubled Ship

Cohane is no stranger to the inner workings of Reed’s. He served as its Chief Sales Officer from 2007 to 2022, a period during which the brand significantly expanded its national footprint. His resume is steeped in the beverage world, with senior leadership roles at industry giants like PepsiCo and The Coca-Cola Company, as well as the once-ubiquitous SoBe. Most recently, he served as Chief Sales Officer at Eastroc Beverages and founded Rootstock Brands, Inc., a consultancy advising beverage companies on go-to-market strategies.

This extensive experience, particularly his deep-seated knowledge of Reed's own history and distribution network, is what CEO Cyril Wallace is betting on. “Neal’s deep understanding of Reed’s, combined with his extensive experience scaling beverage brands, makes him uniquely qualified to lead our operations as we enter our next phase of growth,” Wallace stated in the announcement.

However, the company Cohane returns to is vastly different from the one he left. Recent financial disclosures paint a stark picture of the challenges ahead. The company has reported a three-year revenue decline of over 44% and is operating with a deeply negative operating margin of -42.12%. Financial statements filed in 2023 carried a “going concern” notice, indicating auditors had substantial doubt about the company's ability to continue operations without significant changes or new capital. The company reported a net loss of over $20 million for the year ending December 31, 2022, with a stockholders' deficit of $8.47 million, highlighting the immense pressure on the new COO to drive operational efficiency and, most importantly, top-line growth.

The Mandate: Conquering the Crowded Beverage Aisle

Cohane’s stated objectives are direct and aggressive, focusing on the fundamental mechanics of the consumer-packaged goods industry. “Our primary objectives will be securing new channels of business, expanding distribution through new doors, increasing velocity across all existing channels, and deepening our distributor and retail partnerships,” Cohane said.

For Reed's, these are not just corporate buzzwords; they are survival imperatives. Expanding distribution means getting the company’s ginger beers and craft sodas onto the shelves of more of the nation's grocery, convenience, and specialty stores beyond its current 32,000 locations. Increasing velocity is the critical metric of how quickly products sell once they are on those shelves. A brand can have wide distribution, but if the products gather dust, retailers will quickly replace them.

Achieving this will require a masterful strategy in an intensely competitive landscape. The market for natural and better-for-you beverages has exploded since Reed's first established itself in 1989. The company now competes not only with a proliferation of nimble craft soda startups but also with the massive resources of behemoths like Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, which have their own portfolios of natural and premium beverages. Cohane’s ability to differentiate Reed's brands and strengthen relationships with the distributors who control access to store shelves will be paramount.

A Broader Strategy of Corporate Reinvention

Cohane's appointment is the latest and arguably most significant in a series of dramatic corporate maneuvers aimed at stabilizing the company and rebuilding investor confidence. The past year has been one of significant flux in the C-suite. Cyril Wallace himself was appointed CEO in May 2025. This was followed by the resignation of Chief Commercial Officer Charles Burlson in September 2025, the same month Tina Reejsinghani was named the new Chief Marketing Officer.

These leadership changes have occurred alongside aggressive financial restructuring. In October 2025, the company executed a reverse stock split to shore up its share price, a common move for companies trying to maintain their listing on a major stock exchange. Just this month, Reed's filed plans for a $10.7 million stock offering as it pursues an uplisting to the New York Stock Exchange, a bid to attract a broader base of institutional investors.

Viewed in this context, hiring Cohane is not just about filling a role; it is a deliberate choice to bring in a known quantity with a proven track record in the very areas where the company is struggling. It's a bet that his experience and pre-existing industry relationships can be leveraged quickly to execute a turnaround, providing the operational results needed to justify the recent financial and leadership reshuffling. The move aims to project stability and strategic direction to a market that has been wary of the company's performance. With his return, Reed's is signaling that its reinvention strategy is now shifting from financial engineering to a ground-level assault on sales and operations, led by a commander who already knows the terrain.