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The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

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Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#31

Post by adolph »

itishappy wrote: post #17
Zak wrote: post #12

I always thought the litigation and regulatory pressure over this was misplaced. Consuming a single serving of the most outrageous product described in the article (22oz, 12% alcohol, 156mg caffeine) is not acutely dangerous to a healthy adult who isn't about to drive a car. Chugging multiple of them is a bad decision of course, but it's just as easy to drink other alcoholic beverages to excess - perhaps easier with…

A can of FourLoco contains 4.75 servings.

Do you have a citation for “4.75 servings?” The one thing from 2010 I could find has a serving size of one can.

https://www.fatsecret.com/calories-nutrition/four-loko/four-...

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#33

Post by [deleted] »

antonvs wrote: post #18
antonvs wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd have to ask for more than three and a half shots of vodka to match the alcohol in a 22oz Four Loko can.

Correcting myself: I was thinking of a different can apparently. That 12% ABV can mentioned in the article corresponds to 4.4 shots of vodka (using standard US 1.5 oz shots of 80 proof vodka.)

[deleted]

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#34

Post by gnabgib »

michaelt wrote: post #20
TylerE wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very few adults, especially if we’re talking 40+, are healthy. By that age almost everyone has high blood pressure or asthma or a bad knee, or whatever.

I don't think "people aged 40+" were four loco's target market. Isn't this stuff mostly for 20-somethings on their way to a nightclub, who want to get drunk and stay up until 4am?

Were they, perhaps, the target market when they were 20 years younger?

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#35

Post by supportengineer »

TylerE wrote: post #15
Zak wrote: post #12

I always thought the litigation and regulatory pressure over this was misplaced. Consuming a single serving of the most outrageous product described in the article (22oz, 12% alcohol, 156mg caffeine) is not acutely dangerous to a healthy adult who isn't about to drive a car. Chugging multiple of them is a bad decision of course, but it's just as easy to drink other alcoholic beverages to excess - perhaps easier with…

Very few adults, especially if we’re talking 40+, are healthy. By that age almost everyone has high blood pressure or asthma or a bad knee, or whatever.

I think I live in a different part of the world than you do.

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#36

Post by margalabargala »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #25
itishappy wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A can of FourLoco contains 4.75 servings.

An yet you can still buy cans of other malt drinks with even higher ABV and volume. An aisle over, you can by 1.75L of vodka for $9.99. That is 40 servings!

A major difference is that bottle of vodka can be closed after being opened.

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#37

Post by minitoar »

its_ethan wrote: post #27

I'm a young millennial and Four Loko's were still somewhat popular at my college. Maybe it was just a localized thing.. they went under the name "sidewalk slammer" where you would (quickly) drink half of it, then pour in a Red Bull (or other energy drink). So still finding a way to get that combo of caffeine, and still using the (at that point) slightly "retro" branding? Never tried one myself lol

I think that practice came to be when 4loko was forced to lower the caffeine content.

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#38

Post by itishappy »

adolph wrote: post #31
itishappy wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A can of FourLoco contains 4.75 servings.

Do you have a citation for “4.75 servings?” The one thing from 2010 I could find has a serving size of one can. https://www.fatsecret.com/calories-nutrition/four-loko/four-...

At 12% ABV, a serving size is 5oz.[0] There's 23.5oz in a FourLoco.

IMPORTANT EDIT: Apparently these labeling changes were made specifically due to a lawsuit against FourLoco.[1] So you're totally right, a serving was 1 can, despite having almost 5 drinks worth of booze.

[0] https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohols-effects-health/overview-a...

[1] https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2013/02/...

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#39

Post by SOLAR_FIELDS »

antonvs wrote: post #11
solardev wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, as a Millennial, I must've totally missed the memo on this stuff. Never heard of Four Loko or energy beers at all... sounds disgusting.

They weren't actually called energy beers. In the US, they fall under the same legal category as beer, which is "malt beverage", but beer is just one type of malt beverage, drinks like Four Loko are another. They're closer to drinks like "hard lemonade" or "hard tea", which aren't beer. They're made by adding malt liquor to some flavored drink.

The author must have just been trying to be cute, because yes, they were never referred to as energy beers. In fact, Four Loko was so popular that the brand itself suffered from genericization, where all caffeinated malt liquors were colloquially referred to as Four Loko

Re: The electrifying rise and litigious fall of energy beer

#40

Post by dylan604 »

lukev wrote: post #26
Zak wrote: post #12

I always thought the litigation and regulatory pressure over this was misplaced. Consuming a single serving of the most outrageous product described in the article (22oz, 12% alcohol, 156mg caffeine) is not acutely dangerous to a healthy adult who isn't about to drive a car. Chugging multiple of them is a bad decision of course, but it's just as easy to drink other alcoholic beverages to excess - perhaps easier with…

> just as easy Citation needed. The social context matters. Alcohol and caffeine are not a wise combination. Socially, consuming both in parallel isn't common (Red Bull excepted, I suppose, but that was exactly the target market and inspiration for these as well.) The amounts are also deceptive from a cultural standpoint. Most people are not expecting a tall can to contain _nearly the same alcohol as a full bottle of…

> Alcohol and caffeine are not a wise combination.

Yet, what does every single person that's trying to sober up ask for or have suggested to them? Coffee.

One of my favorite movie scenes is from "Flight - 2012" with Denzel and John Goodman trying to make Denzel's character "right". I love it for that fact that they don't try to call it "sober him up", but just to get him balanced. That's all the caffeine in the coffee is trying to do, yet people insist on saying "sober up"

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