Cocaine?

One of my favorite new blogs, Starling Hunter's The Business of America is Business, has a post about a new energy drink called "Cocaine". Here's his introduction to the product.

A Las Vegas-based company, Redux Beverages, has launched a new product- a highly-caffienated cola with a highly controversial name, Cocaine. Redux bills Cocaine as a "legal alternative" to the real thing and claims it is "350 percent stronger than Red Bull" yet lacks the "sugar crash". According the The Daily Mail (UK), the drink is being marketed in Los Angeles and New York and primarily to teens.

In his post, Mr. Hunter asks the following question.

A final question which I have not seen raised yet is whether Cocaine will be marketed disproprotionately to minority teens the same way high-potency malt liquors have been to minority adults - with the help of rappers.

I'd be shocked if that didn't happen. Once you've jump started your marketing effort by tying it to an illegal drug, the best way to use that momentum is to go where that illegal drug is used and prized. If they had named it Whale Blubber, then I'd suspect they would target the Aleuts. With a name like Cocaine, I'd look for marketing tie-ins with thrash metal, punk and rap artists.

Looking at the situation from the point of view of the bands, this is a great opportunity to get free publicity. By endorsing the product you might be able to catapult yourself into the limelight as protests against Cocaine occur. Your band could gather all kinds of credibility as it flips off the white bread losers that are trying to repress your freedom of speech.

Write a song about it and add plenty of obscenities and references to the hopelessness of growing up in an oppressive country that holds you down and you might just have a hit on your hands.

Update: The Business Innovation Insider tells us that the distributers are nicknamed "dealers." Cool!

Cocaine also has a MySpace page. Like you didn't see that one coming.