What CX Moments In Energy Drinks Category Can Teach Any Brand

The world’s energy drink consumption has steadily risen since 2014. As these quick energy boosters are seamlessly available in gas stations and nearby grocery stores, more people are buying them frequently, which reflects in market growth.

People, especially children and adolescents, like energy drinks to boost energy and consume as a drink in social gatherings. This consumption has significantly increased in the last 5 years since there has been a 26% increase in the sales of energy drinks in the USA from 2017 - 2021. The positive correlation with the customer review volume in the past couple of years proves this increased rate of energy drink sales.

(Source: Statista: Energy drink sales in the United States from 2017 to 2021)
(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

These data are a cue of the future energy drinks market's high potentiality. Hence, it is worth discussing what happens in the customer experience of energy drinks and the rising trends in this.

In the 5th episode of the CX See Why show, Dan Gingiss - The Experience Maker™, and Hagen Panton, VP of Global Sales Capability at Nutrabolt, discuss the deep insights, interesting customer experience moments, and trends in the customer experience of the energy drinks industry.

Even though the show focused on energy drinks, the key points and takeaways apply to any brand irrespective of their industry. Since customer experience is an inevitable element in any business, this show will be an insightful resource to get ideas you can apply to your brand's customer experience practices.

All data and insights that backed the show are based on 31,870 customer reviews analyzed by Clootrack.

In this episode, Dan and Hagen talk about:

Positive customer experience that helps to cut through the noise
Challenges around successful customer experience
3 specific tips on customer experience to focus on CX moments that matter

Top Customer Concerns in Energy Drinks

Dan asked Hagen to guess the top 2 areas of concern from the shuffled key terms that mostly popped up from negative customer reviews.

He nailed it!

Without taking much time to think, Hagen said its Unavailability and Chemicals & Additives.

He said Unavailability was a big issue in 2020 - 2022 since these are the covid years. And also, in these covid years, people were very concerned about diabetes and other health conditions, so they feel chemicals and additives have a higher risk for their health.

Interestingly, he said it in the correct order as well. More customers’ concerns were around Unavailability, and then, around Chemical and Additives.

Let’s Dig Deeper into the Unavailability of Energy Drinks

As Hagen already mentioned, in the significant last 2 years of covid, there has been a considerable gap in the supply chain of all products.

Here, the unavailability of energy drinks dipped in the second half of 2020 and again started to increase when the pandemic hit its peak.

(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

The main issues customers reported at this time are, they can't find their favorite energy drinks in the grocery stores, and products are getting out of stock in supermarkets and nearest convenience stores.

Check a few customers verbatim -

"the thing is, you may not be able to find this product at your local supermarkets since all markets don't yet sell it."

"We love this brand. Unfortunately, the grocery stores in our area do not carry the lemon lime flavor so we order from ecommerce."

"Can't find this product anywhere in my local area and was buying at the workplace a while ago"

Let's check what Hagen thinks about it from a brand's perspective.

The Shortage of Cans and Distribution Disruptions Were Core Reasons

Hagen said many convenience stores were closed, and as we know, no one was driving to convenience stores or work. The roads were empty, and the supply patterns were also broken. The only place people could go was to big-box retailer stores as they were kept pantry loading when people were trying to buy their essentials. At the same time, they were also trying to buy their favorite energy drinks! But, there also, people often couldn't get their favorite brands.

Other issues were around the insufficient cans. Brands like the Big Red ran out of cans due to a lack of aluminum supply. At the same time, people started drinking a lot more alcohol. This led most cans to go to alcohol-based brands like White Claw. So the energy drink brands faced this lack of cans, and at the same time some natural disasters that caused various manufacturing plants to shut down. In many ways, energy drink distribution was wracked during this time.

Popular brands like Budweiser, Coke, and Pepsi have various distribution teams employed to keep the distribution flow intact. This unlucky time, many of those brands cut back on people because they weren't making their convenience store routes. So, it was cans shortages and distribution disruptions that contributed to unavailability.

Then Dan raised a question on how does a company like his address these issues to both distributors and retailers and say this is the issue we are going through, and we will be back on those grocery stores after a specific period? Also, how did they convey it to end customers? Did they use social media or any other platform for that?

Hagen said Nutrabolt could drive traffic from Amazon in these times. This also helped to improve the brand growth since they could be in stock any time and the distribution flow was intact. Otherwise, they would have struggled with the accelerated shipping costs. Even though the shipping cost significantly increased during that period, it didn't cost much to ship the powder products. But to send drinks, they needed heavy cases and the correct box; this cost twice as much and was not profitable for the company.

Many other energy drink brands used beer distributors to deliver their products to continue the distribution. When it comes to Nutrabolt, they did not run out of supply, and they continued the powder side business with the same big-box retailers. Even though some retail stores couldn't fill the powders for some period, they made it with beverages.

The Role of Chemicals & Additives in Negative Customer Experience

Customer concerns around chemicals and additives in energy drinks have relatively increased from 2020 to 2022.

Check a few customer verbatims -

"I bought the ginger ale soda and it had a strong chemical taste it was disgusting and I will never buy it again...nor would recommend it. Very disappointed."

"I was excited about this with all of the good reviews, but I am left again with no alternatives to the real thing that don't contain artificial sweeteners. VERY DISAPPOINTED."

"What is worse though is this one has a strong chemical sweetener aftertaste. Wife disliked it as well, not something I would buy again."

As per customer reviews, the main area of negativity is around artificial sweeteners. Since customers prefer low sugar or no sugar, it's tricky for brands to offer a drink with a flavor but without sugar or artificial sweetener content.

(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

Hagen says about this, "I believe people want cleaner products. I saw artificial colors as a big issue when we first launched the C4 brand. We used artificial colors and enhanced flavors. But being fitness minded, our customers didn't like the colors, and after the first run, we pulled the color right out. We did a second run because we listen to our consumers."

He also says, when brands need to focus on customers who prefer the flavor, it often comes at the cost of sugar or artificial sweeteners. And people prefer everything natural and organic.

For example, there is a beer type IPA (India Pale Ale), considered local and kind of like farm-to-fresh food. It became popular before covid. Then people just liked IPAs because they were interested in local craft beer and thought it was healthier than the big brands.

The 'no sugar' trend is a proliferation in the energy drink business. And when a brand tries to sweeten a drink naturally with Stevia or monk fruit, the consumer doesn't like it. So, it's like customers don't want artificial sweeteners but are not buying brands that come with natural sweeteners since they don’t like the taste. When they don't like the naturally sweet taste, sweetened without sugar, they stop buying the brand itself.

An ideal drink would be zero calories, zero carbs, zero sugar, and zero flavors. And people want a world where everything we consume is organic, perfect, and clean, but it's hard for people to accept that level of perfection when it comes to the taste.

Top Delighters of Customer Experience in Energy Drinks

Dan again came up with a guessing game for Hagen. This time it is to get the top 2 drivers that delight customers in energy drinks. Hagen guessed Taste & Flavor, Energy Boost, and Price.

(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

Yes, Taste & Flavor is the top delighter! And then comes Price, since the data is from the pandemic period. But, it’s a bit strange how the Energy Boost went as the 5th delighting driven only after Sugar Content and Usage.

There is no doubt that Taste & Flavor would come on top as people don’t like to drink anything that doesn’t satisfy their palate. Because if a food or beverage product doesn’t taste good, they will struggle to sell them in the market. The Price cut on products during the pandemic attracted more customers, which increased positive reviews around Price. And then, customers seem pretty satisfied with low sugar content, usage, and energy boost.

Taste & Flavor

When it comes to taste and flavor, the level of artificial flavors and sweeteners play a considerable role. If 2 brands use the same content, but one uses artificial flavor/sweetener, and the other uses the organic substitute, people will like the one with organic content. Because there is a chance that the other one leaves a strong aftertaste on people’s palates, brands need to balance the amount of ‘artificial flavors’ they are using since customers do not like that aftertaste and strong chemical flavors.

Also, people’s tastes are different from one person to another. If one person likes a specific flavor, another person won’t like the same taste; they would prefer some other flavors. Hence, satisfying a large group of customers with different tastes and flavor preferences is a challenge.

Traditional Energy & Performance Energy

Hagen mentioned about 2 kinds of ‘energy’ customers looking for an energy drink. There is traditional energy and performance energy. Traditional energy drinks are the basic energy drinks that come in different colorful cans. And, there is performance energy that is sugar-free and has functional benefits. Those drinks are considered for performance energy. It is a growing segment in energy drinks right now.

What Are the Most Prefered Flavors by Customers?

When Dan asked what would be the most preferred flavors in energy drinks as per Hagen’s experience, he answered ‘unflavored’ since most top brands are unflavored, and the indescribable flavor names and mix of multiple flavors like ‘Rainbow Unicorn.’ He guessed it even before seeing the customer review trend around flavors. He also said, “we started entering the weird name era.”

He was right!

(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

Customers raised more reviews on 'unflavoured.' Then, they like multi-flavor, strawberry, cherry, original, mango, orange, and cola.

This doesn't surprise Hagen since Frozen Bombsicle flavor is his brand's number one flavor. Multi flavors like skittles and starburst of C4 are also top performers.

People's preferences over flavor will change over time. And the tastes are evolving. For example, he said, "I drank orange flavor when I was a young kid, but now, my go-to every day is a starburst, cherry or frozen bombsicle flavors."

He said people would be more inclined to write a review on a weird flavor like a rainbow unicorn or frozen bombsicle. They would comment on a new taste than a flavor that has been there for more than twenty years. That could also be a reason for the higher amount of reviews around multi flavors.

Hagen says people indeed like an energy drink with a flavor. But they are unaware of the specific flavor name. Like, if they bought a drink with a flavor but an indescribable mixed taste we mentioned above, like 'rainbow unicorn,' they may mention it as an unflavored drink in their reviews. Also, some seltzer or beer has a flavor name but are unaware that customers can’t mention it explicitly.

What Are the Rising Trends in Energy Drinks?

As the flavors of energy drinks are changing and evolving, their preferences over other aspects like the contents in these drinks also change. People's lifestyles are changing; they are becoming more and more health conscious and spending time on workouts and exercises, adopting diets like vegan, keto, sugar-free, etc.

When following these lifestyles, diets, and exercises, they do not want to avoid energy drinks from their diet, but at the same time, they want to be conscious of the ingredients in the drinks.

Offering different varieties of these energy drinks specially prepared for different lifestyles and diets helped customers include their energy boosters in their daily lives.

When we check the most preferred types and their trend over the years, it is found that caffeine-free and sugar-less are the leading trends.

(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

There are also other trends like vegan, gluten-free, and organic in this list.

Hagen feels that this is because more brands have started to try different varieties with tags like ‘gluten-free,’ ‘sugar-free,’ etc. Customers are mainly reading the labels even though those products contain those contents. Consumers want to see these tags, and then they feel healthier and feel this is the drink they want.

Is there a Gender Gap in Energy Drink Consumption?

It seems like there is a gap when we check the review volume.

(Source: Clootrack Energy Drinks CX Tracker)

The majority of energy drink consumers are men compared to women. When we check their experience across different aspects, it is interesting to see that sugar content is more of a concern for men than for women. And, packaging and availability are concerns for both men and women. But women customers raised more complaints around availability.

Also, it is interesting that we cannot see caffeine content as an essential aspect in reviews from women.

Key Takeaways for All Brands

There are 3 takeaways from this episode that all brands can apply in their customer experience practices.

Solve the Product Availability Challenge

We know many companies are dealing with supply chain issues, logistics problems, an insufficient supply of ingredients, and disrupted distribution. These are continuing concerns for the brands. Here the main precaution a brand can take is to communicate with their customers and let them know that this is a problem they're seeing because they don't want to be in the dark about it and should know when they can expect their favorite energy drink back on the shelf.

Never Assume the Obvious - Look Deep into What Customers Want

Look deeper into what customers want. In the energy drink world, the apparent factor we consider is 'energy boosting.' But it wasn't; it was about taste and flavor, and several other aspects came above energy boost. So brands should not go forward based on assuming anything without gathering customer data.

Find Innovation Opportunities Based on Key Trends

We saw there were some different trends in gender, diet types, and flavors. Sometimes, even just changing a marketing language may make a significant impact. For example, saying that you are organic even if you've already been organic or vegan before. Explicitly saying it might gather more customers since people are looking for a vegan alternative or sugar-free. When they see the word 'vegan,' they're happy, making them want to buy the product. So focusing on these trends and figuring out how to innovate products based on them is smart.

For more interviews with CX leaders, check out the episodes of The CX See Why episodes here.

What CX Moments In Energy Drinks Category Can Teach Any Brand

Do you know what your customers really want?

Clootrack