From $250,000 in two months to $12 million a month: How Dylan Jacob built BrüMate

His beer kept getting warmer. Ten years later, BrüMate sells much more than a solution.

Dylan Jacob launched BrüMate’s first products in 2016 after struggling to find a cooler for his beer can. The brand has now expanded into everyday drinkware, with a growth story shaped by repeated redesigns, clever marketing and the expensive business of keeping up with demand.

Dylon Jacob began making drinkware after he couldn't find one for his beer can to remain chilled. Brumate came into existence in January 2016 as his third venture into entrepreneurship.


A decade later, Jacob's brand has expanded into an everyday drinkware brand that features products like water bottles, wine vessels, tumblers, children's drinkware and hydration packs

Jacob's bigger ambitions began with smaller problems.

While recalling his experience in the 2018 starter story interview, Jacob said that in the first company that he built during high school, supplied replacement parts to repair shops. He sold that company in 2014.

He began his second venture, selling high-end glass tiles. He gained valuable experience in sourcing and product development during this period. He later sold the second company, which he claims is still functioning well. His thrill lay in designing something people would carry around and use. A beer can offered an unexpectedly practical starting point.

The making of BrüMate

Jacob took a rough sketch to a local engineer, who turned it into a digital model. He then sent the file to a 3D-printing company and approached breweries selling beer in 16-ounce cans.

According to his account, he spent about $3,000 developing 100 rough prototypes to gather feedback. The response helped establish demand, but it also exposed weaknesses in the design.

He went through 13 more prototypes, with development taking almost a year.

Meanwhile, another idea moved faster.

The Winesulator, an insulated container designed to hold a full bottle of wine, had fewer moving parts and was cheaper to bring into production. Although the beer cooler had inspired the creation of BrüMate, the wine product reached customers first.

Jacob tried crowdfunding, giveaways, bloggers and small influencers. Among all, Facebook advertising and blogger coverage proved more useful, and he gradually concentrated his spending there.

He bets big on email marketing and says, "We also have a huge focus on our email list - we currently have around 250,000 subscribers, and they make up roughly 20% of our monthly revenue stream. I am sure you have heard it over and over again, but email marketing is SO important."

By the time inventory arrived in November 2016, he had built a list of roughly 7,000 potential customers.

In his 2018 account, Jacob reported $250,000 in sales during the November–December launch period. Sales reached $2.1 million in 2017, and by July 2018 he was reporting more than $1.1 million a month.

Behind those figures was a founder doing much of the early work himself: building the Shopify website, learning advertising through trial and error, answering customers and developing products.

Growing sales brought expensive problems. Demand created its own pressure. Products had to be manufactured and paid for before the next wave of orders could be fulfilled.

In his 2018 interview, Jacob recalled using air freight repeatedly to replenish inventory, an expensive way to avoid running out. His determination to retain complete ownership also constrained the money available for expansion.

The business eventually changed its approach. The early ambition to control everything had given way to the practical demands of running something larger.

Forbes reported in March 2020 that BrüMate had generated nearly $20 million in sales in 2018 and $36 million in 2019. In a separate 2020 follow-up with Starter Story, Jacob said monthly sales had risen above $12 million. That was a reported monthly figure, rather than a full-year revenue total.

More recent data offers a narrower picture. E-commerce analytics company Particl estimates BrüMate’s June 2026 e-commerce sales at $4.8 million. This is a third-party estimate of online sales, not a company-confirmed figure covering every sales channel.

The product expansion is easier to see. As of September 2026, BrüMate’s website lists everyday hydration products, children’s drinkware, mugs, coolers and hydration packs alongside its beer and wine range.

A decade after its beginnings, the business serves far more occasions than the drink that inspired it.

Jacob kept revising the product, testing the audience and changing the plan when the results called for it. Even the first item he sold was different from the one he initially set out to make. "The idea you start with is not going to be the idea you end with so it really just comes down to how hard you’re going to make it on yourself while you go through the changes."

While sharing advice for to-be-entrepreneurs, Jocab said, "Start your own practice business just for experience—find a product you want to sell, source it, find your target market, and figure out unique ways to market to that audience. Even if you don’t make money, the value of the knowledge you’ll gain is invaluable. Each business I started was a stepping stone that ultimately gave me the tools I needed to scale BrüMate into what it is today."