I’ve always loved the great outdoors. Whether it’s surfing, skiing, snowboarding, diving, or hiking, living life to the fullest by doing stuff in nature is what I enjoy most.

As soon as our kids (we have twins) could walk, we started taking them on hikes. We travelled for close to six months when they were just 2½ years old—just small enough to fit in our backpacks but strong enough to hike themselves when they felt like it. Our son in particular would always want to go off the path, and we would call that “going on an adventure”, even if it was only ten minutes and ten feet away. He loved that more than anything else. When he was about five, I asked him, “When do you feel like you’re on an adventure? What do you consider an adventure?” He simply said, “Taking a path nobody’s been on.” And I thought: Wow. Of course that’s been said many times before, and probably more eloquently. But the fact that that’s how a five-year-old kid feels shows that adventure is in all of us—it’s in our nature. I believe the wording is spot on. Something becomes an adventure when you feel you have to find your own way, when you never know what you will encounter next, and when you have to use your own creativity, skill, and perseverance to overcome whatever comes your way.

Those are exactly the reasons that made me want to start my own business—to completely follow my own path and overcome all the challenges thrown my way with nobody telling me what to do. It’s not easy; starting a business is a new adventure in that it’s something nobody has ever done before. Sure, millions of people start their own business, but every new business is a unique adventure. When I started out, I had no idea what it would end up looking like. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow or next week—and certainly not next year. One day something fails tremendously and I feel broken; the next day I manage to achieve something significant and feel amazing. That, to be honest, is what makes it so terribly exciting. I’ve always been fairly adventurous, but I’ve never felt more alive than now.

I knew I wanted to launch something that I completely believed in and would also make a positive impact. Even though I’ve always craved the outdoors, I’ve lived in fairly large cities all my life: Rotterdam, Johannesburg, Mexico City, Amsterdam, London. And I believe that as the world becomes more urbanized—54% of the world’s population now lives in cities—we will continue to lose our connection with nature. A big part of that is the food we eat and the beverages we drink. As most of my experience and knowledge is around beverages, I decided to focus on creating an energizing drink that’s 100% natural and cuts back massively on sugar (without replacing it with any other form of sweetener).

I have made it our mission to harness, enjoy, and celebrate nature’s pure and abundant energy.

• Harness nature’s energy. Instead of synthetically creating a drink and its ingredients in a laboratory, I wanted to source them from nature and harness the power that’s already there. Why cook up in a lab what can be found #INOURNATURE?

• Enjoy nature’s energy. I promised myself that I would go out more, surf more, ski more, hike more—just enjoy nature more! TEAM TENZING loves the great outdoors and everyone who does—people like you going on a hiking, surfing, or biking adventure who aren’t after a trophy but who tackle nature’s challenges to grow and discover who they really are. After all, adventure is #INOURNATURE.

• Celebrate nature’s energy. Our third commitment is to celebrate nature and all it has to offer. And by celebrating, we mean not only sharing its beauty but also protecting it in any way we can. We invest 5% of all our profits back into nature. Read about this commitment here. We vow to play our part in minimizing everything that does not belong #INOURNATURE.

Here at TEAM TENZING, we are super excited as to what will happen next. If you want to stay informed, sign up for our newsletter below and follow us on Instagram here. You can also join TEAM TENZING! We’re growing fast and there are many ways to get involved—we would love for you to join us on this adventure.