Invest in Ghost Town Oats

Your favorite barista-owned oat milk company is fundraising again, baby!

For those of you who need an introduction, we’re Ghost Town Oats. We’re the first Black-owned, queer-owned, barista-owned oat milk company. Ghost Town Oats was developed by three baristas who were a part of oat milk’s initial rise to fame in some of the first shops to carry it. Having been unpaid ambassadors while also seeing its marketability skew towards the upper economic class of society, it was time to flip the script: make a premium oat milk of our own and create a brand that appealed to a broader audience. We formulated Ghost Town Oats for incredible taste, steaming capability, and versatility, and the reviews are in: we’re a hit.

From coast to coast, wherever it is available, Ghost Town Oats is your barista’s favorite oat milk. Even though we knew we had something special, we couldn’t have anticipated how many people would resonate with it so quickly. Coffee shops all over the US love our bright pink cartons, bold branding, and, most importantly, that it’s made by baristas. Oat milk is only growing in popularity, and we’ve seen that the public wants to support a relatable brand of promise.

Why Ghost Town?

Ghost Town started with a conversation about what was missing in oat milk. We’re still in the early days of the oat milk boom, with oat milk quickly climbing to the top of plant-based milk sales. It wasn’t so much a question of if there was room in the market for another oat milk as what a new oat milk company would look like.

Oat Milk Share in the US 2022

• Total Plant-Based Milk Sales in the US: $2.299 billion
• #1 Almond Milk: $1.277 billion -1%
• #2 Oat Milk: $527.44 million +50%

Perhaps the most evident issue was the perception of oat milk drinkers. The marketing, branding, and availability of oat milk suggested it was a luxury product with clear sustainability and wellness benefits to boot. But there was an apparent disconnect in reaching those for whom oat milk can make the highest positive impact: people of color. In the US, up to 80% of Black Americans and Indigenous Americans may be lactose intolerant, while up to 95% of Asian Americans may be lactose intolerant. This is who we hone our focus on, and with ease, because our team is the target demographic and is creating exactly what we want to enjoy.

Our Progress Highlights: Wins & Challenges

• CHALLENGE: Tightening cash flow as operations and manufacturing scale.
• WIN: Stabilized cost of goods, reassessed pricing to increase cash on hand and ensure profitability.
• CHALLENGE: Convoluted logistics and too many operating partners resulted in reduced costs (you don’t know what you don’t know).
• WIN: Streamline in-house logistics, reducing warehousing costs by 50% and freight costs by 30% by the start of Q3 versus the beginning of 2023.
• CHALLENGE: Three total sellouts, resulting in periods of $0 in incoming revenue.
• WIN: Reached $1,000,000 in revenue in the first ten months of public availability and produced the millionth carton.

The Raise

We’re ready to turn things up a notch. We’re raising $150,000 to scale production dramatically and jumpstart new relationships in distribution. 

When it came to start strategizing on another fundraising round for Ghost Town Oats, we knew one thing for sure: we wanted our community to have another opportunity to get in on our success. What’s most important is that baristas become our stakeholders, too. 

Baristas have been the most important ambassadors of oat milk since it took off in the US in 2016. Baristas are professional stewards of the collective experience of the daily coffee ritual for our society. Our mission as a company is to build an ethical, world-changing business…and part of that is opening investment opportunities to baristas and everyday people like you. 

Think about it: the inflation rate is higher than the % of interest you’re getting in your savings account. We lose more money in saving than in investing. This is how the historically marginalized have been kept from having their dollars build businesses. We want to change that: invest in Ghost Town Oats today. 

Beyond the obvious benefits of having a financial stake in our company, you have a commitment from us that we will continue to be as transparent as possible about our journey. While this has always been a wild ride from the start, it has also been so rewarding to see the impact this product is making in every aspect, from reclaiming the culture of oat milk to simply making better-tasting lattes. We are in this for the long haul, and we can’t wait to grow even bigger together.