Bull Market | Outside Online

You Are Here:

Home >> Bull Market

Today's Question
How do you make primitive snowshoes? answer

What should you do if you get lost driving in a snow storm? answer

Today's Question
What is the greenest ski and snowboard on the market? answer

Can I really damage a coral reef with sunscreen while snorkeling? answer

What kind of dog will make me look manlier? answer
Is there a sport that safely combines my twin passions for guns and kayaks? answer
How come most of the world's cultures enjoy eating goat, but Americans don't? answer

Online Favorites

Special Issues

Photo Galleries

Outside Magazine April 2002

Page:

The Big Idea: CASE STUDY #1: Adventure Sells
Bull Market

RED BULL'S DOMINANCE seems more remarkable when you consider that it immediately attracted a swarm of shameless knockoffs backed by beverage giants. Anheuser-Busch has a drink called 180, Coca-Cola has one called KMX, and Pepsi now has two: SoBe's Adrenaline Rush and a Mountain Dew spinoff called Amp. All come in skinny silver cans. Adrenaline Rush is Red Bull's nearest competitor, lagging far behind with just 12 percent of the American market. Some big firms are also dabbling in a new category called "nutraceuticals," a miscellany that includes teas, juices, and carbonated drinks that make holistic-sounding health-swig claims. Pepsi's SoBe has several products in this category, and last year Coke bought a nutraceutical-maker called Mad River Traders.

Red Bull's rise has also come against a backdrop of strange rumors and sinister speculation. Pretty much from the beginning, health officials in other countries have had questions about it. In Norway, Denmark, and France, Red Bull's sale is currently limited to pharmacies, and it has not gained approval for sale in Canada.

The controversy stems from a handful of deaths in which an overload of Red Bull (sometimes in concert with alcohol) allegedly played a role. In March 2001, a Swedish woman collapsed and died on a dance floor after reportedly slamming down a couple of cans that were spiked with alcohol. Hers is one of three cases under investigation in Sweden that feature accidental deaths possibly linked to Red Bull—two involving alcohol, one not. What's the problem? One theory is that Red Bull with liquor acts like a poor man's speedball—a dangerous mix of upper and downer.

"What most concerns me is the alcohol," says Gregory Stewart, co-medical director of the Institute of Sports Medicine at Tulane. "If you're mixing it with vodka, it keeps you awake and alert"—counteracting the depressive effects of the liquor—"and you run the risk of alcohol poisoning."

Red Bull's Emmy Cortes has heard all this before, and has a ready, multipronged response: The company doesn't market Red Bull as an alcohol mixer; "individuals should exercise common sense"; and no one has ever proven the drink to be harmful. In the United States, an FDA spokeswoman says the agency is aware of Red Bull, but there's currently no lurking prospect of federal regulation—most of the reported problems have more to do with using the product unwisely, she says, than with Red Bull itself.

The rumors are more amusing. They tend to focus on the drink's caffeine and other ingredients, especially taurine—it's bull testosterone, it's bull semen, it's bull urine, it's an aphrodisiac, etc.

Cortes laughs off the more outlandish of these, and says the caffeine level is about 80 milligrams per can, equal to that in one "weak" cup of joe. Fine. Then what is special about the drink, and about taurine in particular? Taurine is important, she says, because "in times of stress and strain, your taurine levels are depleted, and Red Bull replaces them." Dr. Stewart laughs right back at that, dismissing the idea that boosting taurine levels has a meaningful impact on physical or mental performance. Cortes herself concedes that "taurine alone isn't gonna give you the same kick as Red Bull." The key to the "kick," she says, comes from the combination of caffeine, taurine, and glucuronolactone, a "carbohydrate that rids your body of toxic substances."

Uh-huh. Here's another possibility: The secret is, there is no secret.

An interesting precedent for this confusion involves good ol' Coca-Cola. When it started life more than 100 years ago, it was, in fact, a patent medicine. It famously had a "secret formula," and early on its promoters made vague claims about the "invigorating" power of its mysterious ingredients, touting "the wonderful Coca plant and the famous Cola nut." (The cocaine element of the secret formula, always minuscule, was reduced to nothing by 1903.) Red Bull might seem like the anti-Coke today, but the echo of those early, pioneering salesmanship efforts is loud and clear, and leads to the second law of murketing: Confusion is good. Dopey rumors and allegations of danger actually help sales.

Page: