Jim Tonkin

James S. Tonkin, a 37 year veteran, is a private sector brand marketing and beverage development professional who has designed and implemented national infrastructure for his clients in the food and beverage industry. Tonkin has successfully created and implemented business and financial strategies for domestic and international firms focusing on: production and manufacturing; branding; sales; marketing; and distribution. In the last 15 years, Tonkin has promoted brand and marketing programs for many clients in the bottled water and functional food/beverage industries. His expertise spans the gamut from domestic cheese to potato chips, fortified pet waters to nutraceutical- functional and enhanced beverages.

Tonkin is a frequent industry speaker often heralded as ‘the beverage expert or guru’ in the functional and nutraceutical beverage segment. Speaking engagements have included serving as keynote speaker at the Australian Beverage Summit- Melbourne Australia, Global Bottled Water Congress-Mexico City, International Dairy Congress- Athens, many presentations at WorldNutra Conferences where he sat as an Advisory Board Member, as well as Nutracon and Natural Products Expos East and West and Healthy Foods Conferences. He leads panels at Focus on the Future Forums and Supplyside East and West for Virgo Publishing. Bringing his characteristic blunt but heady wit and “take no prisoners” unabashed style of industry spin, Tonkin’s enthusiasm and heartfelt passion for the industry includes commentary on the state of the beverage industry, new trends, new products, innovation and future prognostication.

Tonkin’s zeal for the beverage industry began early in his career serving as Vice President and General Manager of a West Coast 7–Up Bottler where he produced, marketed and distributed carbonated soft drink brands including 7-UP, A&W Root Beer, Crush and Clearly Canadian. Tonkin then successfully pioneered both a domestic cheese production-distribution facility in northern California and a snack chip company known as Buffalo Chips. Turning his interest back to healthier beverages, he became V.P. Marketing and Sales for the first ‘new age’ beverage in the U.S in 1983- Napa Naturals, which innovatively married natural white grape juice, natural flavoring and sparkling mineral water from Calistoga CA.

Starting a private consultancy in 1986, Tonkin focused on what he knows best – brand management, sales and marketing. His industry expertise and innovative style provided the opportunity to work as “outsource CEO” to many companies over his consulting career including Essentia Water, a nationally recognized structured water, Bio Essentials an innovative glucosamine beverage for joint health and BrainSavers, purporting a new ‘Tri-Component Program’ of nutrition-cognition-physical exercise to the aging population through an eight week enhancement protocol.

One of Tonkin’s co-creations included Hound Hydrators Pet Water for PETsMART. Another was SmartSnackÔ, a wellness product-marketing company wholesaling only healthy snack foods and beverage sold in vending machines. Working with many start up and innovative companies trying to break-through the ‘cloud deck’ is what Tonkin truly enjoys. He helps to find and develop management teams, builds broker networks, design sales strategies for distributors and retailers alike, and works towards exit strategies to sell/merge smaller companies with strategic partners, industry giants or venture firms. He has success in raising capital and determining the correct source of capital for each venture.

Tonkin is also linked to Outsource International, a corporate and project development firm comprised of current and former CEO’s, other top executives, legal and investment professionals who provide technology-transfer, business acceleration, project development, philanthropic and consumer products consulting services to its clients, worldwide.