From Desperation to Innovation: The creation of Finni’s Finest

Just months after Finnia Forsberg’s first birthday, the healthy baby her father Christopher knew disappeared. One-year-old Finnia spent her nights vomiting and she wasn’t meeting the anticipated growth milestones.

Her worried parents took her to the doctor in search of a solution to whatever was ailing the girl. After a battery of tests, the team discovered that Finnia has both celiac disease and lactose intolerance.

The good news was that with diet modifications, the child would recover, but the Forsberg family soon discovered it was not going to be easy to provide the girl with dairy milk alternatives that matched the nutritional value of organic whole milk.

“What I found in doing the research was that all of the plant-based milks currently in the market were okay, but not great. What one has, another is lacking. Coconut milk has fat, but no protein. Pea milk has protein but no fat, and oat milk has carbohydrates, but no protein and not much fat. I was worried too, because a lot of the plant-milks currently on the market are packed full of oils. If you look at the ingredient label, it lists water, rapeseed oil or canola oil and then everything else. I didn’t feel good giving my daughter water and oil at such a young age,” Christopher Forsberg said.

The concerned father began mixing plant-based milks in his kitchen to create a new blend of milk that would meet his daughter’s nutritional needs. Not only did Finnia thrive while drinking the nutrient-rich concoction her father created for her, but she and her siblings loved the taste of drink.

Forsberg knew many other families were struggling to meet the nutritional needs of children with food allergies and other food-focused illnesses. He managed to create a plant-based milk that was not only gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, additive-free and organic, but also something his kids happily consumed.

Amid a counter filled with empty sippy cups, Forsberg knew he had found an opportunity.

After obtaining the needed licenses and finding a commercial kitchen with the right certifications, Forsberg got to work. It took a lot of trial and error for him to create the plant-based milks with the right concentrations and textures. It took most of 2022, but eventually he mastered the art of blending his milks into just the right ratio so that the final result was as tasty as it was nutritious.

He named the beverage after the little girl that inspired it.

“I made Finni’s Finest in small five-gallon batches and then took it to the Brookfield Farmers Market and started selling it. I got my pitch worked out and I would tweak things in the kitchen week by week. It provided proof of concept,” he said.

Convinced that the beverage would find an audience, in 2023 Forsberg hired a Food Scientist to refine his recipe for production and started looking for a contract packager. He also participated in the Food Finance Institute’s Fellows Program to prepare to take the beverage to market.

The first pallet of Finni’s Finest arrived in June. The plant-based milk does not require refrigeration and is shelf-stable for 18 months. The 11-ounce boxes of milk will be sold in packages of four at the anticipated retail price of $14.

Foresberg plans to introduce Finni’s Finest to consumers through local grocery retailers. He then plans to open an online store for the beverage in Q3.

“Finni’s Finest came out of a pain point. It hurt when my daughter was diagnosed with celiac disease and lactose intolerance … for two nights I just was so upset. I think out of that pain came this desire to have better nutrition for her but also anybody else that has the same exact problem of needing to replace whole milk, but in a healthy way,” he said.

To learn more about this emerging business, connect with Finni’s Finest here.