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Shoppers scrambled to grab the Prime energy drink promoted by YouTubers Logan Paul and KSI at Aldi, leaving shelves bare

Dec 31, 2022, 22:28 IST
Business Insider
Logan Paul (left) and KSI promoted the drink.Getty Images/WireImage
  • Aldi says it's sold out of Prime just one day after it started selling the energy drink.
  • Videos on social media show people waiting outside stores and scrambling to buy the drinks.
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Shoppers scrambled to grab bottles of Prime, the energy drink promoted by YouTubers Logan Paul and KSI, causing Aldi to run out of the product. Some stores appear to have sold out within minutes of opening.

"As with all our Specialbuys, Prime was available for a limited period only and has now sold out," a spokesperson for Aldi told Insider on Friday.

The discount retailer started selling Prime on Thursday for £1.99, or $2.40, in three flavors: Blue Raspberry, Lemon and Lime, and Ice Pop.

Aldi limited customers to one bottle of each flavor per purchase in anticipation of "high demand."

"The drink will be a Specialbuy — and as with all Specialbuys, once they're gone, they're gone," it said in a press release.

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There has been huge demand for Prime. The drink was available in seven flavors online and cost £24.99 for a 12-pack but stock has sold out. One mom told Insider that her son's school had banned students from bringing in the drink because kids were trying to sell it.

Videos posted on social media showed huge lines of people waiting outside Aldi stores before they opened to get their hands on the drink on Thursday morning.

Bloomberg reported that more than 100 people were waiting outside a store in southwest London on Thursday morning to buy the drink. Shopper Kristina Sheppard told The Daily Mail that she saw people seemingly buying whole cases of Prime and parents "pushing" children. The whole store was "absolute carnage," she said.

Some videos showed people scrambling, shouting, and shoving to get their hands on the drinks, but some customers said they had a much calmer experience.

Rob Leat, a fitness trainer and online coach from Bristol, said he arrived at his local store 15 minutes before it opened and there was already a line of people there wanting to buy the drink. Customers were told to head straight to two checkouts to buy it, he said.

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"Hats off to Aldi," he said. "It was really well organized and everybody in the queue was respectful, nobody tried to queue jump."

Chay Phinbow, a teaching assistant, told Insider her 11-year-old twins had wanted to try the drink since it was launched, and that it had been "extremely difficult to get hold of for many months."

Phinbow said that on Thursday she arrived at the Kidbrooke branch of Aldi in southeast London about half an hour before the store opened. They were the first in the line, she said.

By 7:55 a.m., there were some 150 people waiting for the store to open but Phinbow said: "Although there was a mad dash the staff handled it fairly."

Brandon Tough said he'd only managed to get his hands on the drink twice – once at supermarket chain Asda, which was the sole Prime distributor in the UK before Aldi started selling it too, and once at the German discount retailer. He used the app Prime Tracker to find out which stores had the drink in stock.

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Asda started selling the drinks in September and limited them to three bottles a customer.

"We knew the drink would be popular which is why we picked it up exclusively," an Asda spokesperson said. They noted that greater supply meant that stocks had improved, leading to fewer long lines for the drinks.

"We certainly aren't seeing the kinds of scenes that we were a few months ago," the spokesperson said.

Many who bought Prime are fans of Logan Paul and KSI, who have been promoting the drink on their social-media platforms.

Leat told Insider he had followed KSI for a long time, "so I wanted to see for myself if his product lived up to the hype."

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"It was a pretty average drink but I did like the ice pop flavor," he said.

Sam Kinsella, a landscape gardener from Bedfordshire, told Insider that he'd bought it because his son had seen it on TikTok. His verdict was much less positive. "It's not a nice drink at all," Kinsella said.

Jake Dickinson, a motor factory manager from Lincoln, told Insider that some flavors were better than others.

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