Formulate
Recipe development and pilot batches — for our own brands and for partners whose concept still needs work before it can run.
Detroit’s beverage company · Est. 1980
From bottling line to shelf.
We formulate, bottle, warehouse, and deliver — our own brands and yours. Home of Towne Club, Kist, and Frostie, made on our lines and moved on our trucks.
- 1980Founded in Detroit
- 1,800+SKUs on our routes
- 487kSquare feet
- Michigan Cherry Towne Club
- Michigan Berries Towne Club
- Orange Towne Club
- Root Beer Towne Club
- Vanilla Cream Towne Club
- Cream Soda Towne Club
- Cola Towne Club
- Strawberry Towne Club
- Grape Towne Club
- Ginger Ale Towne Club
- Strawberry Watermelon Kist
- Cherry Pomegranate Kist
- Orange Mango Kist
- Blackberry Raspberry Kist
- Kiwi Strawberry Kist
- Raspberry Lemonade Kist
- Lemonade Kist
- Root Beer Frostie
- Vanilla Root Beer Frostie
- Diet Root Beer Frostie
- Blue Cream Soda Frostie
- Cherry Limeade Frostie
- Concord Grape Frostie
- Orange Frostie
- Pink Lemonade Frostie
- Strawberry Watermelon Frostie
- Green Apple Frostie
What we do
One company, the whole journey.
Most beverage companies do one piece of this. We do all of it, under two roofs, a few miles apart on Detroit’s east side.
Bottle
Flexible lines built for specialty runs rather than one endless SKU. Glass, PET, and cans, with changeovers that make short runs economical.
Warehouse
More than 1,800 SKUs picked and staged from a 315,000 sq ft distribution center opened in 2010 for exactly this job.
Deliver
Our own trucks, our own drivers, our own routes. Direct-store-delivery to retail, convenience, schools, and vending.
Private label
Your name on the label, our plant behind it — from formulation and artwork through to a case on a pallet.
Get to shelf
The hard part is rarely making the drink. We already have the retail relationships and route density to place it.
House brands
Three names with real history.
Not licensed, not distributed on someone else’s behalf. We own these, and we make them here — cane sugar, glass, and a flavor range that still outruns the shelf.
Detroit, mid-1960s
Towne Club
We Have Your Flavor
The Detroit pop that families bought by the wooden case. Still made with pure cane sugar, still bottled in glass.
The Towne Club story
Chicago, 1929
Kist
Sparkling since 1929
One of America’s first fruit sodas, reborn in Detroit as a clean, zero-sugar sparkling water.
The Kist story
Catonsville, Maryland, 1939
Frostie
Born in a jailhouse. Aged into a classic.
A genuine American root beer with an origin story you could not invent — and a craft soda line that grew out of it.
The Frostie story
Co-packing & private label
Your brand. Our plant.
IDI has bottled for White Rock, Faygo, Boylan’s, and BAWLS. If you have a beverage and need someone who can produce it, warehouse it, and get it onto a shelf in Michigan, that is a normal week here.
White Rock
Faygo
Boylan's
BAWLS
Your brand
+ more
Operations
Two buildings, a few miles apart.
One makes it. One moves it. Splitting the two is why short runs are economical here and why the routes leave on time.
172,000 sq ft
Manufacturing · Bottling · Corporate
IDI Headquarters & Bottling
IDI’s production floor and corporate offices. Flexible bottling lines run house brands — Towne Club, Kist, and Frostie — alongside co-pack and private label programs, with changeover capacity built for specialty runs rather than one endless SKU.
315,000 sq ft
Warehousing · DSD Logistics · Route Operations
IDI Distribution Center
Opened in January 2010 to consolidate direct-store-delivery under one roof. More than 1,800 SKUs are picked and staged here for routes covering retail, convenience, schools, and vending across Southeast Michigan.
1980
Founded in Detroit
Family-run beverage operations on the city’s east side since 1980.
172,000sq ft
Manufacturing & bottling
Dedicated production floor for house brands and co-pack partners.
315,000sq ft
Distribution center
Opened January 2010 to consolidate direct-store-delivery operations.
1,800+
SKUs distributed
Beverages, snacks, and coolers moving through Southeast Michigan routes.
Where to buy
On shelves across Michigan.
Towne Club, Kist, and Frostie sit on shelves at the chains below, at dozens of independent Michigan grocers, and at specialty shops that ship glass bottles anywhere in the country.
- Kroger
- Meijer
- Busch's Fresh Food Market
- Walmart
- Target
- SpartanNash stores
- Plum Market
- Nino Salvaggio
- Holiday Market
- Country Market
- CVS Pharmacy
- 7-Eleven
- ACO Hardware
Straight from the plant
The full flavor range is available at our 8 Mile bottling facility — the same building it comes out of.
6400 E 8 Mile RdDetroit, MI 48234
Monday – Friday, 8:00 AM – 5:00 PM ET
Beverage journal
Notes from the plant floor.
What we are learning about formulation, packaging, distribution, and the beverage market — written by people who run the lines.
Reading your sell-through data after the summer
September is when the year's most honest numbers arrive. Most brands look at the total and miss everything useful in it.
Why Detroit is a beverage town
Faygo, Vernors, Towne Club, and a bottling industry that outlasted most of what surrounded it. The reasons are structural, not sentimental.
Water is an ingredient, not a solvent
It is 85 to 99 percent of what is in the bottle, and it is the variable most new brands never think about until something tastes wrong.
Let’s build something worth drinking.
Co-packing, private label, or getting our brands onto your shelves — every one of those starts with a conversation.