Sugar crash: how do UK youngsters feel about energy drinks?
As the UK government considers banning the sale of energy drinks to children, how do young consumers today feel about these products?
Today, the UK government will reveal whether it plans to ban shops from selling energy drinks to children under 16 — or even under 18.
At Streetbees, we recently asked our users (or bees) around the world what they thought about energy drinks and why they drunk them. In the UK, we discovered that most of our bees — 69% — first tried these products under the age of 18:
In other words, any ban would heavily impact on when customers start drinking these products — and that’s a big problem for producers, given that we also found that energy drink customers tend to adopt a brand early in life and stick to it.
Sugar rush?
We also looked into what younger (under-25s) Brits felt about energy drinks — and we found heavily conflicting attitudes.
Almost 4 in 5 (77%) of under-25s say that the drinks ‘feel unhealthy and unnatural’, while 61% say the drinks ‘do more harm than good’ — hardly figures conducive to long-term sector growth!
So why do they drink them? Well, 42% agree that energy drinks help get them into the right mindset for work or study (although almost as many, 34%, disagree). And when asked about what they like about them, flavour and energy boost came top:
One more negative? Well, 49% of under-25s say they’ve previously felt they’ve consumed too many energy drinks in the past.
So what?
Taking young people out of the market changes the game for energy drink brands. Previously, there was one key demographic (as we explained in our previous findings, here) — young men. Hook them and focus on perceived benefits like productivity and mental awareness, and reap the rewards.
If that option is curtailed or removed, the options look rather different — especially as young people are already well aware of the potential negative implications of energy drinks, as well as the positives.
Remove the younger consumer, and does the ban open the door for challenger brands less focused on extreme caffeine highs and sugar rushes, and more on natural ingredients or… taste?
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A quick word on our methodology: The figures in the article are taken from over 1,200 UK Streetbees community members, carried out in July 2018. All of the data was collected by mobile and web surveys, and is accurate to within 3 percentage points 19 times out of 20.
