Energy Drink Research

Aby Jones

Lucozade EnergyAdvert AnalysisAt first glance, the Lucozade energy website is bright and vivid with a lot of young models and various links to several social networking

sites, through this I have concluded that it’s been aimed at younger, sporty audience, however I have also noticed that its aimed at young, partying people – the fact that it’s also got quite a lot of younger generation dialect such as using hash tags and using informal language to appeal to this audience such as, ‘Seen our new TV ad and going mental for the soundtrack?’ Also looking at other analysis’ of the product, it appears that it’s aimed more at a male audience, however I believe it’s gender neutral, there is no use of imagery, colour schemes or content that aims more predominantly at males.

Lucozade has advertisements in a variety of different media settings, its got a television advert, at the moment it’s the ‘YES Project’ which offers Go-pro cameras to consumers which is a reward power use of persuasion, YouTube, for the same reasons as the television advertisement, moving adverts that have featured Gareth Bale, there is posters and banners on websites and public places such as: bus stops and sometimes it’s got sections in magazines such as: Hello Magazine.

When it comes to the design and style of the advertisements, it’s usually quite vivid and bright always using colours such as: yellow, black, white and red which appears to be their consistent theme, for example a magazine advertisement they used to sell the original flavor. When it comes to things like television advertisements, they usually use reward power persuasion to entice the readers, for example, the last man standing advertisement, they use a HD video to show the effectiveness of Lucozade as opposed to water, they use colour imagery here by highlighting the Lucozade side in yellow to capture more of the audiences attention and draw them towards the fact that Lucozade is considered better than water.

The layout of Lucozade advertisements is usually a very bright vivid image accompanied by a bright background, often a model, the logo featured either separately or on the actual bottle itself, as its usually the bottle that the company is trying to advertise. The layout is usually very simple with a higher picture to text ratio.

I think I’ve covered the basic content of these ads, however, its usually a model or several models doing a certain activity, something that requires a lot of energy such as playing football, dancing, running and so on, they use bright colours and a range of post production techniques to create a vivid, unique looking advertisement, there is also some sort of text, whether that’s the name of the drink, the terms and conditions (if it’s something like a promotional offer) or the actual logo of the drink itself, which brings me to the final piece of content, the actual bottle itself – it’s used a lot to put the actual image of the bottle in the advertisements rather than just the logo by itself, this helps readers/viewers to recognize the product itself.

Lucozade EnergyProduct AnalysisThe initial look of the Lucozade products are bright, vivid colours with occasional differences in style for

example: original, orange, melonade, pink lemonade and Cherry flavors are all the same style with the only difference being colours, this is always consistent with the Lucozade logo in slanted text on the front of the bottle in large, bold writing, the logo to me, looks like a bullet shooting through the bubbles which has an emphasis on the sporty appeal of the drink. Strawberry, Caribbean crush, tropical and the Brazilian all have different designs with photographs of models on it and a different colour theme, including sky blue, pink, light purple, dark blue, green and orange, at the moment however, they all feature the same logo designs because of the ‘YES Project’ they are currently doing.

Because of their particular style and look, I think that Lucozade energy appeals to a younger, sporty audience – it also may appeal to students as it’s an energy source and because of the bright, eye catching colours and different variations in flavors, whereas energy drinks usually have an original that tastes the same as others, Lucozade original has it’s own flavor.

The colours that Lucozade seem to keep the same colour theme throughout the different drinks, if you looked at a bottle of Lucozade without seeing the logo you’d definitely know which drink it was, they use a lot of oranges, reds, whites and blacks with the odd bottle being a variety of different colours, especially if it’s new. I forgot to mention the look of the bottle is unique in comparison to other bottles and because of this you can also tell which drink it is without actually looking at the logo.

Lucozade EnergyProduct AnalysisLucozade was originally owned and produced by GlaxoSmithKline until Suntory took over it in September 2013,

it’s produced at the Royal Forest Factory in Coleford, Gloucestershire in England. The purpose and effectiveness of Lucozade energy is to provide calories of energy from sugars which improves performance and endurance, they are marketed as soft drinks and energy drinks.

One litre provides 700kCal of energyA 380ml bottle of Lucozade Energy contains:65.4g Carbohydrates= 33.1g sugars which are 65.4g glucose based.

Suntory Holdings Limited is a japanese brewing and distilling company group established in 1899, it’s actually one of the oldest companies that deals with the distribution of alcohol in Japan and makes Japanese whisky, the business is currently expanding in to other fields such as: soft drinks to sandwiches.

Monster EnergyAdvert AnalysisLooking at the Monster Energy drink website, it’s easy to see that this drink is aimed at both sports fans and sporty people, there

are various images of athletes and professionals wearing clothing that features the logo and it’s also featured on their items such as: bikes, skateboards, race cars and so on. There is also an entire section devoted to ‘Monster Girls’ which is a model based theme, because of this I’d say that Monster energy drink is aimed at a more predominantly male audience. This is quite different in comparison to Lucozade where it’s a more gender neutral aimed drink when Monster Energy is very strongly aimed towards the male audience.

Compared to Lucozade, who often appear on TV and make original adverts for places like YouTube and magazines, Monster Energy only really advertises within the area that they aim for, they are usually advertised through sponsorships like extreme sports such as: NASCAR and the Formula One, they also appear on social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, they make their own videos to advertise on YouTube or they get YouTube stars such as devinsupertramp who creates extreme sports videos funded by the people behind Monster and often Rockstar. They also have their own Google plus and have their own instagram. They are also sponsored by music bands around the world, such as: Shinedown.

The design and style of Monsters advertisements are usually through sponsorship therefore it will be HD videos of athletes doing extreme sports and being filmed in a very candid fashion, the same goes for if it’s a YouTube video, when they are featured in magazines and the like, it’s usually very dark backgrounds with the can as the centre piece, especially when they bring out a new drink flavor and want it to stand out, recently they brought out ‘The Doctor’ which is actually a very bright yellow advertisement. The font style is usually a very unique, almost bone like calligraphy, it’s all upper case and then there is another font for the ‘Energy’ and yet another font for the name of the drink flavor, these are usually the same font used for the ‘Energy’ part although sometimes it can differ.

The layout usually has the can featured in the middle or on the side and the writing either above or beside it, or it can be on a model/athlete who is sporting the logo in a photograph. The layout of the website is very dark with the logo on the top Left, it’s got a more picture to text ratio. This is very different to Lucozade energy who usually have very bright, colorful advertisements.

Monster EnergyAdvert AnalysisThe website has all of the content provided about Monster Energy, it’s got which products it sells, Monster TV,

Promotions, Events, Roster, Sports and News across the top, I find it strange how the actual products are the last listed thing. The main home page features banners and an almost slideshow of pictures and news snippets at the top, then goes down to feature posts, news, galleries, music and videos. It has all of the social websites featured on the side along with posts made on there and at the bottom it features more posts such as: monster girls, athletes, partners and personalities.

They use methods of persuasion such as: Reward, Expert and Star power – the adverts tells the reader that they will have a better performance after drinking the drink, it’s usually presented on an athletes vehicle or on the clothing of the athlete, sometimes even a model which is Expert power and Star power.

Product AnalysisI’ve already established that because it’s usually sports themed advertisements with a lot of female, almost

naked female models, it’s aimed more at a male audience.The logo for monster energy drink is a very large, toxic green ‘M’ with very jagged, pointy, bone like sections. To

me, it almost looks like they’ve tried to create scratch marks in the can put there by a monster, thus the name and look, this is accompanied by the name of the drink with the look and font I’ve already described, this is the logo that is constantly featured on sports clothing and vehicles/items.

Monster EnergyProduct AnalysisThe product colours are generally the toxic green and black, however the other flavors have quite bright,

interesting designs, monster Ripper has a bright yellow ‘M’ with both yellow and white writing, along with the can looking like a metal bolted wall/door, the doctor is all yellow with bright writing and an image of a sun and moon at the bottom, Monster Absolute Zero has a bright blue and dark purple background against a black ‘M’, Monster Khaos has the exact same design as Ripper apart from it’s Orange not yellow, X-presso monster hammer has an all black can with a red and orange M, Monster Rehab (tea, lemonade and energy) has a black M against a yellow almost explosion like background and Monster Rehab (rojo tea and energy) is a purple/pink explosion against a black background.

Comparing these designs to the Lucozade energy, it’s along the same lines as having different flavors and versions of the original, however, none of the flavors correlate, not even the original, where Lucozade goes along the lines of fun and experimental, it seems like Monster has gone a little off the rails by creating drinks with both energy and tea (non carbonated), energy and juice, energy and coffee and an original monster with double the energy, where Lucozade only uses things like: Cherry, lemonade, pink lemonade and so on. Also, comparing the logos of both products, the Lucozade one is usually a consistent colour with a nice looking, almost all age appealing logo design, whereas I feel Monster has really tried to appeal to an older, more masculine audience just by looking at the logo.

The overall look of Monster energy is quite interesting, I’ve already talked about colour and who it appeals to, the only thing I can say on looks is that it’s a very large can, rather than a bottle (which Lucozade use).

The energy drink was launched by Monster Beverage Corporation in April 2002 and there are now around 34 different dirnks under the ‘umbrella name’ Monster.

Red Bull EnergyAdvert AnalysisLooking at the Red Bull website, it seems a lot more professional than Monster and Lucozade’s – it’s a lot more simple

and clean with all of the different sports that it sponsors listed across the top of the page, the home screen is very clean looking, it’s got the words ‘Wings when you need them’ in bold, white letters in front of both a moving photograph of a dirt bike performing a stunt in front of the Sydney Opera house and the actual Red Bull can. Scrolling down, it’s got sections on ‘how it works’, ‘when to drink’ and ‘what’s inside’ so the viewer can find out more about their drink before they even try it, it then sponsors a few different athletes with quotes from them about the actual beverage. It also offers different products, can lifecycle, the company and the cartoons. The colours are very simple, red, blue and white (and a little bit of yellow in the logo), the font is also very simple, it looks like Ariel, there is no fancy writing or imagery, it’s even very simple colours when it comes to the TV advertisements, the cartoons only really slightly vary in colour and if it does it’s only when the can is brought out, which then stands out against the simple white background.

Because of this look, its very easy to determine that these are for professional athletes or very big sports enthusiasts, this is because of the simplicity and the fact that sports are such a large part of the actual website.

Red Bull has a variety of different mediums, they have their cartoon TV advert that used reward power to entice the audience, by using the term, ‘Red Bull gives you wings’ which is their way of saying it gives you an enhancement, i.e. better endurance during a sports session, they also appear in some magazines using posters to advertise their product or by sponsors in sport by having their logo on the athletes clothing or vehicle, for example Felix Baumgartner who has the record for the highest free fall, he sponsored red bull by having their logo on his suit. In honesty, all of the energy drinks I’ve looked at mostly have the same mediums, it’s only Monster who hasn’t had or doesn’t use TV advertisements to get their products out there.

Red Bull EnergyAdvert AnalysisRed Bull uses reward, expert and star power just like Monster Energy because it says that it will give wings to the

person who consumes it, which is basically saying that it’ll enhance their performance, it uses experts because it’s sponsored by experts in extreme sports which also class as celebrities.

Product AnalysisI have already established that due to the sports listed at the top of the website and most of their advertising coming

from extreme sports sponsors, the target market for Red Bull is generally sporty, young/middle aged people and especially for the athletes themselves, which is the same market that Monster aim at, this could mean that they are rivals but often its seen that both Monster and Red Bull logos are featured on sports clothing.

The logo for Red Bull is two bulls running towards each other about to fight and they are of course, red. The two bulls are in front of what can only be described as the sun or a yellow circle. This, I feel is supposed to emphasize on the power and energy that the drink gives to the consumer, the title is above this in red, simple font and below the logo is usually what contained in the drink or what the drink is, i.e. sugar free. There is one of the drinks that has a different look to the others, it’s the silver edition where the whole can is silver with a darker silver fierce looking bull coming down from the top of the can.

The colours are usually red, white and blue although the silver edition is of course silver, this stays a consistent thing throughout the different types of Red Bull, what differs from Lucozade and Monster Energy is that it only has 3 different types of Red Bull and it’s all the original flavor, whereas Monster has a variety of different flavors and colours along with Lucozade.

The general look is that it’s in a 250ml can with the corporate colors, logo and general design featured on the can itself, and it usually has ingredient information on the back, the design is like 2 blocks of colors with a gray design in between/around them, which in comparison to Monster and Lucozade is a very simple design strategy, however, they still manage to have a very successful market.

Red Bull EnergyProduct AnalysisRed Bull was founded by Dietrich Mateschitzm an Austrian man who became inspired by an existing energy

drink, Krating Daeng which was found in Thailand, modified the ingredients to suit a certain market and ‘in partnership with Chaleo Yoovidhya, founded Red Bull GmbH in Austria’ this was created in 1987 and went on to become the ‘highest selling energy drink in the world, with 5.387 billion cans sold in 2013.’

This means, despite the simple design and having a smaller can with a lack of variety in flavors, Red Bull is still more successful than Monster and Lucozade, which is quite interesting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Bull

Red Bull contains:• Caffeine• Taurine• B-Group Vitamins• Sucrose & Glucose• Alpine Spring Water

Scheckter’s Organic EnergyAdvert AnalysisLooking at the Schecklers website, it’s very easy to see that they are aiming at a younger audience, there's bright

colours, fun designs, easy to find information, a lot of images and links to various social networking sites, such as: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pintrest and Tumblr which is more than Monster, Lucozade and Red Bull had to offer – I can also tell that it’s aimed at a younger audience because of the amount of informality within the actual website itself, the way that they’ve equipped colours and themes makes it almost look like their aiming the drink at children, I think what they are trying to do is appeal to adolescents and upwards as they are the main target audience when it comes to energy drinks, especially in this day and age – this makes them rivals with all 3 of the other energy drinks I have looked at.

I think the main medium here is YouTube and TV advertisements, I couldn’t find any magazine ads or posters, so I assume their using quite modern methods to appeal to their audience rather than older techniques, they seem to put more effort in to their website which I think is probably their biggest selling point, therefore the internet has a big part of it, this is a lot like Lucozade which appeals to their audience more which television advertisements rather than posters – although they do those too, in addition, it seems that Lucozade and Schecklers are more similar compared to monster and Red Bull which appeal to similar audiences.

They use a lot of colours on their website, there isn’t any specific colour theme although the writing is primarily a light green or a white, the font always stays the same apart from the logo of the actual company which has serif fonts compared to the rest of the page with sanserif fonts, this is the same as the fonts used by the rest of the companies I’ve looked at except they would use a different colour theme or non-traditional font.

Scheckter’s Organic EnergyAdvert AnalysisAt the top of the website page, there is the logo, the name of the drink, the slogan, promotions, page navigation, a

photograph of the actual energy drink, a photograph of people jumping in colourful clothing showing energy through that and what is in and what isn’t in the drink – further down, using the page navigation it goes through what makes the drink work, what is in the actual drink, how the drink was founded, who founded the drink, contacting the sellers and a gallery for the drink. I quite like how they’ve added what’s in the drink and what isn’t to prove to the consumers that the drink is healthier for them, it gives it that extra selling point.

I think the advertisements use Reward, Referent and Expert power to get their point across, reward because it enhances your energy in a very healthy way because it’s organic and natural, which makes it a referent and the actual creator of the drink gives a statement about the drink itself which is therefore expert power.

Product AnalysisAs I have already covered, I feel that this drink is aimed at a younger audience, possibly students thanks to the colourful

aspect of the advertisements, the can itself appeals to the audience as it’s a small, 250ml can that can be fitted in to pockets or bags, it’s bright and colourful yet its also plain and simple which I think appeals to this audience specific, also the fact that its an organic drink widens the audience specific, there is a huge market for people who want to consume healthier products, especially when it comes to energy drinks which are usually packed full of sugars and synthetic caffeine.

The logo for this drink is very simple, there is no imagery it’s simply a play on typography using the serif fonts in for the name: ‘Scheckter’s’ and then a different colour for the words, ‘Organic Energy’ and then a whole new font for the slogan, ‘Powered by nature’. This is quite interesting as opposed to Monster, Lucozade and Red Bull which put quite a lot of time, money and energy in to creating an interesting logo that correlated to the design of the can or the name of the actual product itself.

Schekter’s Organic EnergyProduct AnalysisThe corporate colours seem to be green, red and white – which, apart from the red are very organic colours – it

appeals straight to the audience it’s aiming at, especially the green, the overall look of the can is very simple – it’s a 250ml can with a lot of white space, the main focus is the logo and the name of the drink, along with the ingredients and promotions such as: Vegetarian Society Approved and Fairtrade Certified etc.

Schekter’s was founded by Toby Scheckter, a South African racing driver,/organic farmer he recently launched Scheckter’s Organic Beverages Ltd.

It contains all of the nutritional facts on the back of the can whichMakes it easier to find for the younger audiences, it also provesTo them that it has natural ingredients.