Mint Makers Breathe Life Into Industry In Need of a Refresher

Matthew Hersh

One of the most difficult obstacles in marketing is how to add a fresh perspective to a product that is not necessarily exciting. Three local entrepreneurs, with their mint-making enterprise out of Hopewell, have done for the mint, what Motorola did for the once-clunky cell phone: made it hip.

Oral Fixation Mints are supposed to be sexy. But lifting a tag line from a prominent mint competitor, they are "curiously" stylish. If it is possible for a mint to convey an image such as this, the mint makers, Henry Rich, Jeremy Kahn, and Jon Harris, have achieved it.

While the mints were officially launched only this past December, their product has already been passed out at the Oscars, Grammys, and the Sundance Film Festival, and they are reportedly eaten by such glitterati as Tim Robbins and Janet Jackson.

The concept came to the founders before they knew what their product would be. The idea was spawned from a conversation between Mr. Rich and Mr. Kahn, both 24, during a smoke break from their jobs at the Princeton Corkscrew Wineshop.

"I was jonesing for a cigarette and I said I guess I had an oral fixation," Mr. Kahn said. "We decided that would be a great name for a company."

Entrepreneurialism was not in the books for these three Ivy League grads. Both Mr. Kahn, who graduated from Princeton High School and Princeton University, and Mr. Rich, who graduated from Harvard University, had the classic "what now?" post-graduate occupation stacking boxes when they began to think about their future plans.

The idea gathered momentum when they brought in their friend and fellow Princeton University alumnus Mr. Harris to handle the design element for Oral Fixation. Mr. Harris, who is the creative director of the company, is "devoted to making everyday objects, like mint tins, beautiful."

The packaging features metallic colors over sleek tin embossed with an emblem that resembles a Rorschach test. On the surface, the emblem is supposed to be two people feeding each other mints, but like the Rorschach, it can be perceived otherwise.

The concept of the tin was created while Mr. Kahn was at the Fancy Foods trade show in Manhattan.

"We designed the logo to be a little out there," Mr. Kahn said. "It's an edgy product, but I think we're in a day and age where that's okay."

Don't be mistaken, the mints are good. As good as a mint is going to get. Flavors like "Mojito Mint" (yes, like the muddled mint and vodka libation) and "Night Light" (a caffeinated chai-flavored mint for night owls) tweaks the customer's interest. Mr. Kahn concedes that he and his partners are clearly going for a visual, stylish, element that will accompany people to places of high society or to the depths of an underground Brooklyn club.

Mr. Rich agreed, saying the tin will attract attention.

"The tins themselves look more like James Bond cigarette holders than a typical mint box, and you have to admit when you hold a tin, you feel a bit cooler," he said.

Mr. Kahn added that the shape of the tins were designed to hold a credit card and license when empty. Just the tools needed for a night on the town.

Speaking of a night on the town, Mr. Kahn said the idea of his mints is clearly geared to the orally-fixative customer, namely, those who smoke. Mr. Kahn said that he hopes the product will assist in deterring smokers. Mr. Kahn himself has found his own product useful in reducing his smoking habit from a pack a day to one to two cigarettes per day.

"There's no medicinal value, but you can pop them in your mouth just like you would a cigarette," he said. But even for those who don't smoke, the mints will "simply be delicious."

But the question remains: what is the future of this enterprise established by these three Ivy League grads? Mr. Kahn said while there are plans in the works for products other than mints, he and his partners are taking it slowly, focusing on keeping theirs more specialized and streamlined, rather than finding space next to Dentine, Ice, and Certs on Wawa shelves. Although there was talk with Hudson News, the Manhattan-based convenience store standard-bearer, about possibly selling Oral Fixation mints at their Penn Station locations, the trio decided now may not be the right time for the mainstream, keeping their item stocked at such locations as Small World Coffee, Bon Appetit, Sakura Express, and, of course, the place where it all began, the Princeton Corkscrew Wineshop.

"At least for now, we need to keep this [stylish] image and if we start selling to the Wawas of this world, then its just going to bring it down a notch," he said. However he did not discount the possibility of someday entering the mainstream. "That's the only way to become profitable," he said.

The company has taken advantage of its success by helping causes that are important to the founders. Recently, Oral Fixation was co-sponsor with Grey Goose Vodka for a benefit for the American Cancer Society. Further, five percent of proceeds from their fructose-free "Sugar-Free Tibet" goes toward finding a non-violent solution to the Chinese-Tibetan conflict.