- May 23, 2025
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David Ahmad’s multiple attempts to create businesses related to building video game communities didn’t pan out. But the serial entrepreneur knew eventually something would click.
“With every single business, you learn a lot and take those lessons and put them into the next business,” he says. “You’ve got to figure out a way to pivot.”
He did just that while working in facilities and public utilities for Collier County by day and focusing on his side businesses during the evenings and weekends. Inspiration struck when his brother had a water bottle from a popular brand that didn’t keep the water cold. That gave him a new mission: creating a water bottle that keeps water as cold as possible for the longest amount of time.
The company was originally called The Coldest Water, but today it’s just known as Coldest. Its story is one of luck, skill and perseverance. And many lessons learned along the way, in hiring, inventory management, strategy, operations, and notably, a big one for Ahmad: the dangers of taking on debt.
“I think a whole lot of business is naivety,” says Ahmad, 37. “You don’t know what you’re getting into.”
Ahmad used to pack shipments himself and bring them to his mailbox in a beach wagon; now Coldest ships hundreds to thousands of packages a day and has staff dedicated to that task. And what started out in a one-car garage in Naples Park now operates out of a 52,000-square-foot facility in Fort Myers
Ahmad, in an interview, declines to share revenue or growth figures. But Ahmad, and his twin brother, Joe, who is COO of the business, talked revenue when they were grilled on an episode of TV pitch competition “Shark Tank” filmed in 2023 that aired in February 2024. On air, the brothers told the Sharks the business had grown from $900,000 in revenue in 2017 to $9.3 million in 2020, up 933%. It then did $15.1 million in 2022, up 62.35% from 2020, with what the Ahmads said was a projected $22 million in 2023.
The brothers, to the shock of the Sharks, said the business, with some 30 employees, also lost $400,000 in its most recent year — the result, they said, in part of expanding the product line quicker than they thought they were going to and having $2.5 million in inventory.
The Sharks told the Ahmad brothers they had too many products and had stretched themselves too wide, and were also critical of their desired deal: a $600,000 investment for a 2% equity stake or a $30 million valuation. Kevin O’Leary offered them a royalty deal, but the brothers rejected it.
Ahmad was by no means an expert on water bottle design when he started out, but he had a degree in engineering that had given him a strong foundation in problem solving. (The penchant for engineering and problem solving, the brothers said on Shark Tank, could be traced to their immigrant parents; their dad is from Jordan, mom from the Philippines.)
“Every product you use daily can be improved dramatically,” says Ahmad. “You just have to sit and think about what is this product missing? And then add those features and functionality you would want in a new product.”
In 2015, he began requesting samples from different factories to find the right thickness and quality of stainless steel to achieve the desired results. Once a winner was found, it was on to creating the bottle itself. When he had a finished product he was happy with, Ahmad placed an order for 1,000 bottles for $14,000.
And then he got cold feet.
“I’d never sold a physical product; I’d always done software or community building or some type of digital product,” says Ahmad. “This was the first time I’d done physical goods.”
So that same night he messaged the factory to try to cancel the order — “It was too risky; it was all my money at the time,” he says. He was told it wasn’t possible.
Yet that wound up being a win. “If the factory had been like, OK, I can refund you right now, the whole business wouldn’t exist,” says Ahmad.
When the initial 1,000 water bottles arrived, he stored them in his one-car garage in Naples Park. The bottle had been specifically designed to be eye-catching on Amazon, and the strategy worked. “On the first day I listed it, I made one sale,” he says. “The next day I made five sales, and it kept increasing every day.”
Joe Ahmad came on board as COO in 2018 to handle marketing, right around the time the company experienced a key mix of luck, skill and timing: it had just launched its first lid replacement product and listed it on Amazon. “The lid ended up being compatible with all these other brands,” says David Ahmad. “Other brands were buying our lid because it was better. We ended up selling 100 units of this lid a day for about five years, which was enough income to start scaling into other innovations.”
The brand’s current hero product is a handled, stainless-steel water bottle available in 36- and 46-ounce sizes that comes with three different lids. It’s 100% leakproof, keeps water cold for at least 36 hours and fits in vehicle cupholders. It comes in a slew of colors and can be personalized and customized with different accessories, something customers love.
“This product is 10 years in the making, combining everything that makes our water bottle the coldest the longest,” says Ahmad. “We tested it against 30-plus brands that are leading brands in the market.”
Another test came from inside the company: debt.
Because of fast growth, Ahmad borrowed almost $4 million last year, which went straight into inventory. Half was in the form of a loan that had to be paid back to Amazon in 12 months; the other half came from leveraging a factory “produce now, pay later” deal. “We scaled so fast and so hard,” he says.
Those experiences inspired him to take a hard look at every aspect of Coldest. Throughout 2024, he educated himself about turnarounds, reading books like “Corporate Turnaround Artistry: Fix Any Business in 100 Days,” by Jeff Sands. “Every single line item and aspect of the business was analytically reviewed for months on end,” says Ahmad. “If we didn’t need it, it was removed. We made massive adjustments to the products, finances, shipping and operations. I call it the 1,000-point pivot, because it wasn’t just one thing. It was 1,000 things.
“We eliminated almost 80% of the products we were selling and focused extremely hard at improving the products we had,” he continues. “We wanted to deliver the best in class in our category.”
He also made major adjustments to the company’s staffing and organizational structure. “We made some hiring mistakes, people who weren’t aligned with our mission,” says Ahmad. “But we have a really solid team in place now, and I definitely attribute a lot of our growth and success to our team.”
Coldest employs about 15 people in Fort Myers and has another 15 remote employees. “It’s not just about talent; it’s about alignment of goals and missions and beliefs,” he says. “When everyone is aligned, it becomes a lot easier to run the business.”
The company has gotten out of debt — a big relief for Ahmad. “I don’t think I’d ever take on debt again,” he says. “It’s actually quite scary.”
“It starts pulling from your cash flow and actually affects how you operate the business day to day,” he continues. “It affected our supply chains, because you can’t order as much when you’re paying debt down instead of scaling.”
Now that he’s gotten to the other side, he never wants to experience that again. “Once you get through that break point, it becomes a lot more fun operating a business without debt,” says Ahmad. “So that’s one of the biggest learnings I’ve ever had — stay away from debt.”
Coldest manufactures its products in multiple factories both in America and in several countries overseas. Its Fort Myers plant and headquarters is actually more space than it needs right now, but it gives the company room to grow. “It will force us to continue to scale and sell more to keep up with the costs,” says Ahmad.
The Coldest.com website is the company’s biggest sales channel, and products are also sold on Amazon, TikTok, and Walmart.com. Its VIP Facebook group of “Coldies” has more than 35,000 members who get exclusive discounts, promos and product access and are often polled about designs and other ideas.
Coldest also has a retail store at Coastland Center in Naples, but physical stores are challenging these days, so Ahmad’s not sure if that’s a good avenue to pursue further. Ahmad wouldn’t mind getting into more big-box retailers like Walmart, but there are challenges there, too. “They’re very commanding of what they want and the price they want, and it’s hundreds of thousands of units at time,” he says. “It’s a lot of risk for us; we’re still a young company and we can’t take that kind of risk just yet.”
Coldest has had five new products in the works for the past year and a half that are coming out this summer. Ahmad teases a little bit about those lines. “We’re going to serve the coffee space as well,” he says. “The products are really upgrades to what we’ve been doing. I truly believe our drinkware is the best on the market — and it’s about to get a lot better.”
