Red Bullying?

I just finished reading an issue of the magazine “The Red Bulletin“. I get it for free once every month with my LA Times on Sundays. It’s disguised as a lifestyle magazine for ACTION|SPORTS|TRAVEL|ARTS|MUSIC as it says on the the top – the tagline is “A BEYOND THE ORDINARY MAGAZINE”, but it isn’t really about lifestyle, it’s about telling the story of the various people and events sponsored by Red Bull, the least foul tasting energy soft drink on the market. As you might have guessed from the name of the magazine, this is a Red Bull magazine. Well, I’m not completely fair, there are a couple of stories about stuff unrelated to Red Bull, but the main focus is on the Red Bull family of overachievers, who are no doubt all of them powered by Red Bull. Or at least by their money.

The magazine is mildly entertaining, not your typical advertising magazine, but obviously with zero journalistic integrity. But it’s another odd element in Red Bull universe, and I’m having a hard time figuring out what that company is all about. At the core of their business they have this energy drink. I’m not a big fan of the taste, but lots of people are, and it does offer some kind of temporary energy boost, same as that of a cup of coffee. For a long time I’ve been baffled by the fact that their consumers are willing to pay 3 to 4 times the price of a can of Coca-Cola or other soft drink, but that just happens to be the case, and obviously Red Bull are making an insane markup with every sold can, considering the amount of money they put into their sponsorships around the world. I don’t mind when companies are good at making money, and Red Bull have obviously struck gold by convincing a lot of people that their product is better than the alternatives.

Or maybe they’re selling a way of life, not a product? I guess most business would love to sell ways of life instead of mere products, because that way you can charge whatever you want for the product that lets you have that way of life. But I’m curious as to what way of life, Red Bull is promoting. Take the way they sponsor major sports teams. It’s not enough to just have your company logo shown on the team jersey; they literally take over the entire franchise and change the team name and jersey colours to some Red Bullish. There is something almost North Korean about that, and I fully the frustration some fans must feel by being Red Bullied out of all of their traditions and history by a way of life.

It’s not that I’m going to stop drinking Red Bull because of this – that would be hypocrisy on my part – I just thought I’d share my curiosity on the ways of this particular soft drink behemoth.