The Story of Skateboardings 1st Energy Drink | From SKATERADE to PIZZANISTA! + how Monster put them out of biz
If anyone is going to get rich off energy drinks it should be skateboarders right? That’s what Salman Agah and Richard Mulder thought back in the boom of 2004, so they went ahead and started Skaterade. Well Richard backed out before its actual creation but Pizzanista! creator and ex-pro Salman went for it. The original idea consisted of a kind of Advil infused sports drink, but they went with a Red Bull rip off in the end. And they almost made it! But then the big bully Monster Energy came around and ripped off all their ideas and ultimately the plug was pulled. Interesting moment in skate history for sure.
Sample:
It sounds like things were on the right track. Why isn’t the brand around anymore?
Well, there was another thing that I thought was going to be really beneficial but actually worked against us. I was really into racing motocross and a buddy of mine invited me to a race in Sacramento. There was an agent there, I can’t remember his name but everyone called him Hollywood, and he was tripping out on Skaterade because he had a direct connection to Hansen’s [the beverage company that owns Monster Energy]. He told me, “Hey man, I would really like a case of this because I think I could help you get distribution.” I thought it was amazing, so he took it to Hansen’s.
Not even a month later, Monster came out with a new drink and they had basically plagiarized all of our writing and verbiage on the can. They started this thing called the Monster Army, which was based on our website, because we had the Skaterade Army. I remember going to a meeting at Monster, because I had a friend who worked there at the time. I went by an executive’s office and right on the shelf were Skaterade cans. They were just sitting there as a reference. So that was a big blow to us, because had we gotten that distribution, we would’ve been sailing.
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Click to JENKEM for The Story of Skateboardings First Energy Drink
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