I looked at Prime Hydration not long ago — it’s crashing, and the funny thing is: the fans were the problem.
Quick background, if you’re not up on your YouTubers-turned-professional-boxers news:
Logan Paul and KSI spent years feuding and fought each other twice in the ring.
Then they walked out together as business partners, selling a sports drink.
The feud had been one long ad campaign (they say it was real, but it really doesn’t make a difference). Every kid who watched those fights wanted the bottle.
January 2023, Aldi in England puts Prime on the shelf for about two pounds. Kids are literally fighting in the aisles. Stores limit it to one per customer. Resellers on eBay ask up to thirty times the shelf price.
For a sports drink.
By the end of 2023, Prime is doing an estimated $1.2 billion in sales. Gatorade money.
But look at who's buying.
It's not the guy at the gym. It's a ten-year-old dragging his mom to the store because there's a new color of bottle and it might sell out.
That works right up until it stops selling out.
Soon Prime is in every Walmart, Target and corner shop. There's no chase and no resale price. It's just a two-dollar drink.
The kids who made it a status symbol are the first ones to move on.
Prime wasn’t hydrating people. It’s “job to be done” was allowing kids to play a scarcity-gets-me-social-status game. That has a shelf life.
The Prime energy drink didn't help. It has 200 milligrams of caffeine per can, about six Cokes. Chuck Schumer asked the FDA to investigate. Parents noticed.
In 2024, UK revenue fell about 70%. U.S. sales dropped roughly 40% in the first half of the year.
Kids made it. Kids left it.
What I take from it: a sale and a customer are different things.
Prime got a billion dollars of first purchases and not many second ones.
Hype can get you the first one. Only the product gets you the second.
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Judge the product, not the pitch.
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Put it into practice
Pull your customer list from 12 months ago. What percentage bought from you again?
That's your repeat rate. Track it next to revenue every quarter.
If revenue is climbing while repeat rate is flat or falling, you're buying growth you'll have to buy again next year.
Fix that before you spend another dollar finding new customers.
Good luck out there.
Michael
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