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Okay, so the caffeine energy has now fully reached the mount Olympus of social media, and Kim Kardashian has entered the ring with an energy drink. For those of you unaware, Kardashian has partnered with Alani Nu to release a new flavor for their wildly growing energy drink brand. The flavor is....wait for it... KIMADE. That is not a typo -- her debut into the energy drink world is just her fucking first name mashed up with lemonade. Every day we seem to be proving Darwin wrong with how quickly we're hitting reverse on intellectual evolution.
Look I could spend a whole article explaining my gripes about all the culture surrounding the Kardashians and why I blame them for the moral decay of society. But here's the thing: I genuinely don't know if I can find fault in this move. In many ways this is a truly genius move by Alani Nu.
Let's backpedal and talk about the drink itself. I had a chance to drink it this morning.
I have to say, despite me hoping it would be terrible to give me some amazing content, it was absolutely delightful. It was a soft lemon flavor that sort of reminded me of a fizzier Diet Sprite. I was also pleasantly surprised that there was no aftertaste that you get with most zero sugar drinks. At 200 mg of caffeine it holds its own with the Celsius and C4s of the world.
Now read my description once more of the flavor. It was a SOFT LEMON flavor. I realized as I was finishing the drink that this is the flavor profile of the most popular energy drinks in the market right now.
For the casual caffeine drinker and even the more experienced, the trend of the industry is moving more and more away from flavors that feel like steroid injected fruits that just got done slap boxing your taste buds, and more towards flavors that are subtler and more easily consumed by the general public. This is how Celsius has virtually cornered the energy drink market in the past year.
So in 2023, what is the other key business model that has proven to be a life blood for energy drinks? I'll tell you -going buck-wild with social media and branding campaigns. Energy drink companies have insanely active Instagram accounts across the board, and are up there with clothing brands for companies most likely to collab with low grade influencers.
Look at Prime energy. The drink tastes like absolute dog water but because it has the juggernaut backing of KSI, Logan Paul (ew), and the UFC, it is stocked and in high demand in most stores.
So the genius move by Alani Nu on this part comes down to the beautiful mixing of subtle energy drink flavors to reach the masses, and the arguably most followed person on the planet. Since this flavor is a limited time offer, I think Alani Nu is even more genius because they are not shackled to Kim K long term.
Now they have the benefit of all of the Kardashians' sheep like followers who will buy Kimade to post on their own social medias, and it is very likely that these same consumers will fall in love with the brand due to the easy on the taste buds flavor.
My conclusion here is I think we will start to see Alani Nu's numbers spike and they may start to challenge the Celsius monopoly more and more as they continue to put emphasis on their branding campaigns.
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