How Sipping Viking Began: From Field Trip to Flavor Lab
Sipping Viking didn’t start with a boardroom business plan. It started on a Thursday in April 2025 during a homeschool field trip to Jester’s Soda in Sturgeon Falls. We were there to show our daughter how manufacturing works; we didn’t expect to find our future standing right in front of us.
When the owners mentioned their program for custom, small-batch soda development, the atmosphere changed. No long debate was needed. We’d been searching for a business we could build together as a family—something authentic that we actually believed in. We looked at each other and knew: We were becoming soda makers.
Two Weeks to Launch: The First Viking Soda
From that initial spark to our first market stall took exactly fourteen days. While it sounds like chaos, it was a sprint of pure execution. We built the plan, designed the logo, and locked in our identity.
The first flavor had to be Honey. To us, it was the only “proper” Viking soda—smooth, natural, and timeless. With our first recipe ready, we shared a table at the Sudbury Market with Dave Wickenden, and on May 10, 2025, Sipping Viking was officially born.
The Science of “Good Pop”: The Caramel Apple Challenge
What followed was months of our home transforming into a full-time flavor lab. We quickly learned that while some flavors come by instinct, others require an obsession with detail.
Our Caramel Apple was our most trying mission. It took a full month of careful calibration to get it right. It started as an overwhelming profile, but through constant tweaking and tasting, we refined it until it tasted exactly like a crisp, real caramel apple. It’s a labor of love that we are incredibly proud of today.
The Viking Code: Cleaner Ingredients, Better Bubbles
We wanted to create a drink that was cleaner than anything else on the shelf. We developed a set of rules that we still live by:
- No “Bad Stuff”: We strictly exclude high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), dyes, and preservatives.
- Real Ingredients: We use real fruit and juices in our drinks. Additionally, if it doesn’t taste good, it doesn’t go in the can.
- The Wilson Way: Where there’s a Wilson, there’s a way.
- The Sacrifice: We drink a lot of bad pop so you don’t have to.
Growing with the Sudbury Community
The Sudbury Market has become our home base, and the local community is the reason we keep growing. Today, our eight earned flavors have moved from that first market table to the shelves of local partners:
- Andrew’s Your Independent Grocer in Coniston
- Joyful Home Gift Studio in Lively
- Truly Northern Farms – The Shed
Nearly a year later, we are still that same family. We are still testing, still tweaking, and still drinking the bad pop to ensure you only ever have the good stuff. We raise our soda to you, our customers! Skål!!
— Lisa & Ken & Evy