One summer’s day. Colin and Lucas are standing in front of a drinks machine at Antwerp Central Station, looking at a bottle of chilled Ice Tea in a vending machine. Dopper bottle in hand, they realise the absurdity of being able to fill a bottle with drinking water anywhere, yet still having to buy soft drinks in plastic bottles or cans.
This sums up the intrinsic problem that soft drinks go hand in hand with disposable packaging. Extensive research revealed this was just the tip of the iceberg: huge quantities of water were being carted around needlessly, and, even worse, flavourings were full of sugar or chemical additives.
With help from their two best friends, Lukas and Mathijs, an initial prototype is soon developed. This first version sees a successful trial period at Ghent University.
One year later, Dripl was born: with version 2.0 of the soft drinks vending machine and an enthusiastic team on board, they are on their way to reinventing the industry.