The kombucha that traveled from California to a town in Badajoz

"God came to see you."

This phrase from Milagros, Beatriz's mother, is probably the one that best summarizes the success of Komvida, the kombucha brand founded five years ago by Beatriz Magro and Nuria Morales (both from Fregenal de la Sierra, 35 years old).

“I decided that I had to go and with a backpack and all my savings I went around the world in 2016. The first place I came to was California and there I tried kombucha.

Being a vegan and having given up alcohol, the taste of that soft drink struck me and it was a great revelation for us," Magro explained to EL PAÍS, sitting next to Morales in the space that Komvida has opened in Madrid.

The miracle that took place in that first sip has resulted in what is now, five years later, Komvida.

Beatriz and Nuria, born in the same town in Badajoz and friends since they were teenagers, had shared the same journey: studying away from home, graduating and coming to the capital to work, like many of the sons and daughters of their generation who lived in the called Spain emptied.

And although the two had studied very different careers -Nuria has a degree in Chemical Engineering and Beatriz, in Translation and Interpreting- they were clear that, sooner or later, they would set up a project together and in Fregenal de la Sierra, the Extremaduran town where Nuria now lives 100% and Beatriz, 50%.

“After trying it [kombucha] I was obsessed.

And what do you do when you get obsessed with something?

You tell it to who you love the most: your best friend,

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The resurgence of kombucha

That is how Bea asked Nuria to join her trip and that is how she also tried that fermented drink that was born in China 2,000 years ago and which the emperors themselves considered the elixir of life.

A fruity, bubbly tea made from a

a mass composed of yeast and bacteria, and which had become the probiotic concoction that every inhabitant of California drank.

“That was where the best kombucha brands were and where we could learn from the master kombucha makers.

Because in Spain we have the best brewers, the best wine cellars, but there was no product like it.

We ourselves knew it, when we went out to dinner or to a party if you don't drink alcohol, or don't want a sugary soft drink, there are few or no alternatives”, contextualizes Morales, who returned to Spain earlier to start laying the rails of what is had become his dream and what is now his project.

"After a while we decided that she would come back earlier to start working on our formula," adds Magro.

If Apple was born in a garage in the 94024 California zip code, Komvida arose in 06340, which belongs to Fregenal de la Sierra, a town of less than 5,000 inhabitants in the southwest of the Extremadura province of Badajoz.

These two young entrepreneurs were clear that the center of operations was going to be their town.

“The south of Extremadura is the land of the Iberian pig and, from now on, of kombucha”, points out Morales.

And so Nuria and Beatriz's mother, Milagros, began to "waste liters and liters of kombucha" until they found the key in a family attic, among homemade basins and decanters, Morales explains.

“The factory and our business had to be where we could promote female leadership in an area where there are hardly any opportunities,” says Nuria.

“My mother, 53 years old,

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Bea and Nuria, businesswomen and now also mothers —of three children and of two, the last one just two months old, respectively—, know how difficult it is for a woman to be able to reconcile her work and professional life.

"For me it was difficult to integrate my professional ambition with that of being a good mother," confesses Magro, who explains that around him he found that all the mothers he had known up to now had given up their working lives;

and the businesswomen with children that he knew did not talk about it, so he admits that he had no references to look at when he had his first offspring, at age 30.

The Komvida project had all the elements to be "a Molotov cocktail", as Magro explains, and not get ahead: best friends who become partners, the family involved, with a product barely known in the Spanish market and a factory in a poorly communicated town

Even so, in 2017 and after having developed the first three flavors of Komvida —lemon and ginger, green tea and red fruits—, Nuria and Bea decided to found the brand and start selling their products

, as well as in the organic market, a comfort zone where kombucha was not someone else's drink.

Months later, and thanks to the news leaking that Queen Letizia drank Komvida, her sales skyrocketed.

After a long time of going door to door, in the last three years they have managed to triple their turnover and be market leaders, as well as being in the refrigerators of large supermarkets such as Carrefour and El Corte Inglés, among others.

Her latest project, in this idea of ​​seeking synergies within the world of healthy eating and with other women, has been to team up with Nerea Zorokiain Garin, founder of Ferment Art. Nerea leads a fermented vegetable company and has launched with Nuria and Bea, a limited-edition

of unpasteurized fermented vegetables packed in 200-gram jars of traditional sauerkraut, red cabbage sauerkraut, baechu, kimchi, and a mix of beetroot, carrot, onion, leek, and garlic-based vegetables.

Thanks to their fermentation, they become, they say, the perfect combination to repopulate, balance and strengthen the microbiota.

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As with their kombucha, the strategy with these fermented vegetables is to reach every possible corner with healthy products, because they feel like they belong to the town, but also to the world.

“It would not make sense for it to only be available in large cities, being Fregenal de la Sierra like we are, a town with a highway just over an hour and a half away.

It is part of our vision that our kombucha be accessible in any corner, be it town or city," explains Magro, who, like Nuria, is clear about one of her goals, in addition to promoting a healthier and more sustainable diet: "Where today there is a cola, in three years there will be a Komvida”.

We assume that the good refrigerated distribution network they already have and their perseverance will do the rest to work this miracle.

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