Redline in Hot Water… Again
VPX (makers of Redline) have kindly donated $25k to a school in Florida after 4 kids made themselves ill.
The students, all eighth-grade boys about 13 or 14 years old, complained of an increased heart rate and were sweating profusely after sharing a Redline, which promises ”the ultimate energy rush” on its bottle.
They were taken to Memorial West Hospital, where they were treated for nonlife-threatening injuries. (From Miami Herald)
The kids told officials “…that they had each taken a few sips of Redline,”
Yeah. Right.
These drinks have warnings on them kids, and Redline has a LOT of warning. Retailers — what were you thinking of?
CEO of VPX wrote a great statement in response to the incident.
VPX/Redline is the first and only energy drink in the nation (to the best of my knowledge) to preemptively warn not to sell to children and to also warn pregnant persons not to consume caffeine which may be harmful to the health of the fetus. These warnings on energy drinks will soon become law and VPX/Redline is pioneering a new standard while legislation catches up to this relatively new challenge.
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If anything, this incident has served as a great marketing opportunity and exposure for Redline, making them stand out from the plethora of energy drinks.
They couldn’t buy a more effective marketing gig with a mere $25k. AND that’s “donation” = translation: tax-deductable expense for the company.
I hate to say it, but my Redline tolerance has gone up a good bit in the past few months. I’m considering switching out my plumbing for Redline because water makes me too sleepy.
This march I drank Redline, I was on my way to school with my friends and we had been up all night so we asked the guy at the store for the best energy drink. (I know they say there only sold in GNC and other health stores, not true, I got mine from chevron.) Anyways, he showed us Redline, I’m 16 And I didn’t have any problem purchasing the drink, it was right beside monster and rockstar so I didn’t think it would be dangerous so as normal I didn’t take the time to read the microscopic print on the side of the bottle and downed it unaware of what I just took in, I got to school and I noticed my heart was beating kind of fast, I just ignored it, this is where it gets intense, after a half hour it was beating faster so I decided to go to the nurse after my friends hounded me about it. So she took my blood pressure, it wasn’t to terribly bad so I went back to class, but after a while I started to get really uneasy I went back to the nurse, my pulse was 175 bpm, and my BP was 190/100 so they had to call an ambulance, the doctor told me I was about 5 beats away from a massive stroke or heart attack, I’m 16, I shouldn’t be having a heart attack at 16. Anyway, here I am 8 months later and suffering from severe anxiety and panick attacks, if you’ve ever had a panic attack you know how they can be, now I can’t drink anything without reading the label, I can’t sit in movie theaters, and I can’t ride in elevators just to name a few, all because of a stupid drink, It has completely ruined my life, and I think they should ban this drink before somebody gets hurt.
This is like the “Redbull Overdose” from a little while back… with this redline thing it was probably anxiety caused by caffeine led them to think something bad was happening when it really wasn’t. Caffeine increases heart rate. Heart Palpitations isn’t nearly as negative as it sounds. Its a paranoia problem combined with a little too much caffeine. Also they more than likely lied about how much they had because the bottle says only drink half. If they admitted to drinking a full bottle each or more then they wouldn’t have had grounds to sue.