Welcome to the Rubyverse
Allow me to introduce Noah Wunsch.
It’s hard to capture his essence in writing, but let me try. He is a book-reading, art-loving, fashion forward maverick that isn’t afraid to push the envelope, but in the nicest way possible. And when it comes to business, he is a master in the art of marketing. Why? Because he understands people and has his finger on the pulse of culture. Case in point: “the biggest drop in history.” He orchestrated the sale of over 200 Supreme skateboard decks at Sotheby’s for $800,000. Let that sink in. A 275+ year old auction house sold items from a downtown lifestyle brand, and Noah made it happen. There are many more examples like that, but now Noah has his eyes set on the future. He has turned his energy to building Ruby, a sugar-free, organic Hibiscus water that launched this month.
But first, let’s get to know Noah a little bit better with a few rapid fire questions:
Q: What are some brands that you admire?
A: It changes every single day, but a few are Thom Browne, Tracksmith, Noah, and Aimé Leon Dore.
Q: What is your favorite book?
A: The Sonnets by Ted Berrigan, which I read when I was 11 or 12, reframed the idea of what structure and rules meant.
Q: What is your favorite pump up song?
A: “Head On” by The Jesus and Mary Chain.
Q: Who is your favorite visual artist?
A: Photography right now is really big for me: Hiroshi Sugimoto, Saul Leiter, Viviane Sassen, Garry Winogrand, and Robert Mapplethorpe.
Q: What is the first thing you do when you get up in the morning?
A: Shower and shave, otherwise my day is ruined.
Q: What is the last thing you do before going to bed?
A: I watch Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Q: How do you define the word "brand"?
A: A successful brand can create community. It creates feelings and a very strong narrative. That’s what we’re building at Ruby, a narrative that people can connect to.
Q: Your background is in publishing/advertising and art. What prompted you to start a hibiscus water company?
A: It happened organically. My entire life I’ve had a very bad sweet tooth and found that as I was getting older I was starting to experience sugar crashes. I knew that I couldn’t allow myself to be inefficient, so I started looking for natural remedies to curb my sugar cravings and hibiscus kept coming up. As I did more research on sugar consumption in America and the beverage space, I realized that there wasn’t a great plant-based water alternative with zero sugar, zero calories, and zero additives. To me, that said “opportunity.”
Q: What is Ruby's guiding ideology? What does it believe / how does it see the world?
A: We want to deliver on the promise “better for you.” If you look at Ruby’s unsweetened label, we’re all zeros. Zero calories, zero sugar, and zero additives but we’re full of antioxidants, electrolytes, and vitamins. We believe no sugar means more fun.
Every brand that is marketed as “fun” has a ton of sugar in it. There are really no brands that lean into the “fun” narrative that aren’t sweet, and I think that sets us up for a really strange psychological narrative around what “sweet” means. It’s important for us to reframe how flavor profiles relate to us mentally.
Q: Ruby has a very unique visual style. What was the inspiration for that iconography?
A: That unlocked for us in a big way when we looked into the work of Ken Price. When we added him to the inspiration board it was like a seed being planted in the ground and a whole world just shot up from it.
Q: What is the "Rubyverse" and what are "shmees"? How would you describe it?
A: The Rubyverse is a sci fi universe we’ve set up. I’ve written a 50 page epic that is about a beverage that might be able to vanquish the evils of sugar from the Rubyverse. In a less literal sense, it is all the things that inspired this brand, and everyone that we share this with is part of the Rubyverse.
The shmee are a people within the Rubyvers and there are other people like “glitches” who are the writers of the source code of the Rubyvers. The shmee are inherently good creatures and they are the originators of the Ruby drink.
Q: Could the Rubyverse expand beyond hibiscus water?
A: I think the Rubyverse already is expanding beyond hibiscus water. We already have the newsletter set up and we’re building various wings that create a value add brand. We want to make sure that we are a brand that goes above and beyond for our consumer base.
Q: Speaking of the newsletter, one of Ruby's Instagram posts describes the weekly dispatch as "no marketing, just culture". What role does Ruby play as a cultural product or as a cultural commentator/aggregator?
A: We want to be a cultural curator. We want to surprise and delight our user base in a really big way, so they look forward to our Sunday email. When they get something from Ruby, we want them to know there is going to be something additive to their life.
Q: What has been one unexpected joy that you have experienced since launching the brand?
A: Getting the first sample product in hand was everything. I broke down crying. It was something that lived in my head and now there was a physical manifestation of it. That you’re going to be sharing it with the world is literal magic; it’s actual magic; it’s alchemy.
Noah is correct. Launching a new brand requires a special type of chemistry: between company and consumer, between product and user, and between art and science. The journey won’t be without its obstacles, but if anyone is up to the challenge, it’s Noah Wunsch. And we know he’ll have fun while doing it.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
