Cray, whose grandparents moved from Bolton to Melbourne in the 1960s, said of the company\u2019s origins: \u201cWe learnt that you can lose litres of water [during a long-haul flight], and that\u2019s a major contributor to your jet lag. That sparked a bit of a deep dive \u2026 We learnt how hydration and electrolytes underpin a lot of things \u2014 not just muscle performance, but your energy, your focus, your immune defence. [These are all] things that are beneficial to everyone, not just professional athletes.\u201d<\/p>\n
The trio, all dual UK-Australia citizens, contacted another friend, Paul Anastasiades,
a British neuroscientist who was doing a fellowship at New York University. \u201cHe had a lot of experience utilising electrolyte solutions, because electrolytes and hydration play a huge role in mental performance,\u201d said Cray, now 36. \u201cHe validated the opportunity and the science, and went very quickly from a sounding board to an integral co-founder.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Dan](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/\/8ef9000d-54f8-43a5-84a0-5893afe354a9.jpg\")
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Daniel Cray, left, brought in neuroscientist Paul Anastasiades to develop Phizz\u2019s electrolyte solutions<\/p>\n
PHIZZ<\/p>\n
Anastasiades, 41, developed Phizz\u2019s \u201call-in-one\u201d formula, which increases water absorption while delivering a multivitamin \u2014 a combination that became the company\u2019s early USP, Cray said. \u201cAt the time, nobody had done that before.\u201d<\/p>\n
The friends realised they were onto something. They debated whether to set up a company in Australia or the UK, deciding on Britain because of its market size and because \u201cLondon is an exciting melting pot of everything, so it was a motivating place to come\u201d. <\/p>\n
In late 2015, Cray and Simmance-Freemantle, 36, quit their marketing jobs at advertising giant Dentsu in Melbourne (Knight, 43, continued to run an events business alongside Phizz), pooled their savings of \u00a350,000 and headed to the capital.<\/p>\n
From their kitchen table in that west London flatshare, the team \u201cbuilt a top-line business plan and then set about trying to find an R&D laboratory\u201d. They negotiated for months, eventually managing to convince a lab to forgo an upfront fee in exchange for a percentage of early sales, and started manufacturing. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe went through a six-month process of selecting labs and convincing them to work with us. This was nine years ago, and the [wellness] space wasn\u2019t quite as popular,\u201d Cray said. \u201cI was getting paid less than when I was at uni working as a barista.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Man](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/\/f65cdcc2-298d-4880-ac34-c75ec25c03a7.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Word travels fast: Daniel Cray has got the company\u2019s name on to black cabs in London<\/p>\n
PHIZZ<\/p>\n
Once the tablet was validated in 2016, the friends \u201cjust picked up the phone\u201d. Cray credits emailing the president of Emirates directly with helping them get off the ground.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had no black book,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019d go to people in positions of higher authority, who wouldn\u2019t be the natural decision-makers [for listing our product], because if we could get their buy-in, it would trickle down \u2026 We had Uber in London buy some [tablets] for their office HQ before we even had a sample; we just had some 3D renders.\u201d<\/p>\n
Soon, Phizz tablets were being gifted to winners of Grammy music awards and could be found in the five-star H\u00f4tel de Crillon in Paris. \u201cAt the time, we weren\u2019t selling outside of our own website \u2026 we said yes to everything and took on momentum wherever it came.\u201d <\/p>\n
But when Covid hit in 2020, revenues were hovering around \u00a3250,000. The founders decided they needed to raise capital to scale up.<\/p>\n
They had offers and interest from athletes, and were even \u201cinvited into the green room of a famous global pop star\u201d, Cray said, but opted to go with a sole investment from the Saudi Arabian Al Blehed family. Phizz raised just over \u00a32 million from the family, who invest in the education, real estate and consumer goods sectors, and came across Phizz on Emirates flights.<\/p>\n
The founders retain a majority stake, and Cray said the team \u201clove the fit\u201d with the Al Bleheds. \u201cThey believed in us as a team and what we\u2019re trying to achieve, and were happy to let us run things.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re a business that\u2019s done one capital raise, and we\u2019re growing off of profit \u2014 we\u2019re not just burning cash.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Dan](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/\/82e8038c-8965-40d7-8f4d-9a1ee4ca9853.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the last 18 months or so, search volume for the word \u2018electrolytes\u2019 in the UK on Google or Amazon has nearly tripled,\u201d said Daniel Cray<\/p>\n
PHIZZ<\/p>\n
The turning point \u201cin terms of revenue and business explosion\u201d came in 2021, Cray recalled, when the company secured a retail listing through a place on Sainsbury\u2019s Future Brands programme<\/a>, an in-house incubator scheme for challenger brands.<\/p>\n \u201cSainsbury\u2019s took a chance on us,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was a huge turning point \u2026 The mission was to break into retail and become a household name and grow the category.\u201d<\/p>\n The journey has not all been smooth, however. In the middle of the 2020 fundraising, Simmance-Freemantle was diagnosed with bowel cancer.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a dark chapter,\u201d Cray said. \u201cIt was a moment of absolute chaos \u2026 It is a bit of a marker now; every week there is something unexpected or that could be somewhat crippling \u2014 but compared to that period, nothing is difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n Fortunately, Simmance-Freemantle is now in remission. He remains a Phizz board member, but stepped back as chief executive in 2021 to return to Melbourne and focus on recovery. Knight also stepped away from day-to-day operations at this point, while Anastasiades continued as head of product development alongside a neuroscience lecturing role at the University of Bristol. Cray took up the reins as chief executive and pushed the company forward with a five-person team.<\/p>\n The company nearly went off track, he said, when it branched out into gut health supplements in 2021. This has been one of his biggest lessons in growing a business \u2014 realising that sometimes it\u2019s the right decision to scrap a product, even a profitable one, if it is distracting from the company\u2019s core purpose.<\/p>\n Cray said: \u201cIn late 2021, we got quite into the gut health world and deployed a pre and probiotic capsule, which had nothing to do with hydration. We gained listings and revenue, but in 2023 we decided to delist \u2026 For 12 months, we thought we could be a more holistic wellbeing business that could do all types of supplements, but that was more about chasing revenue than \u2018who are we\u2019. The decision to rein that in quickly and get back on mission was pivotal.<\/p>\n \u201cIn 2024, we trimmed the international business and just got back to basics \u2014 and that\u2019s what put us in a category leadership position. Now we\u2019re looking to branch out into new markets and new products, but it\u2019s all from the core of a hydration-led solution.\u201d<\/p>\n Phizz has also benefited from being in the right place at the right time. The global wellness industry<\/a> has boomed since the company\u2019s launch in 2015, almost doubling in value from $3.72 trillion to $6.3 trillion by 2023, according to market research firm the Global Wellness Institute.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the last 18 months or so, search volume for the word \u2018electrolytes\u2019 in the UK on Google or Amazon has nearly tripled,\u201d Cray said. \u201cBut we\u2019ve also had new entrants coming in; a huge multinational brand [Liquid IV, owned by Unilever] has spent millions on awareness in the space.\u201d<\/p>\n