Monster Energy (History, FAQ, Marketing & Commercials)

Energy drinks are a pervasive part of our eating culture these days. They are everywhere, and there are many different versions of these drinks that are meant to perk you up when you’ve lost that pep in your step. Monster Energy is among the key players in this space, and people who love Monster energy drinks will swear that no other energy drink is as good.

Red Bull and Monster are the two most familiar names in the energy drink space, but there are a whole host of competitors these days just trying to reach for a small portion of the success that these two drink brands enjoy. Monster Energy owns a 35% share of the energy drink market, and there is no sign of this drink giving up ground to other companies in the same marketing space.

History

Hansen’s is not a young company, and Hubert Hanson and his three sons opened up the Hansen Juices company in the 1930s. They actually used the original plant for all of their operations until 1946, when the company filed for bankruptcy. California CoPackers bought the Hansen assets and renamed them Hanson Natural Company. This was the bottling company that was making juice drink products when the energy drink scene started to make a stir.

Many people do not realize that Monster Energy drinks were first made by Hansen Natural Beverage Company. Recently, the company changed its name to Monster Beverage Corporation, but for all of the early years of the production of Monster, the Hansen name was on the product branding. Most people never notice any of the other branding information on Monster cans due to the very large logo and the all-pervasive and full-wrap branding efforts that are used to make each can.

There are 34 different drinks that are in the lineup of Monster products, some of them targeted at sports performance as well as energy. Monster Energy products are well-known for being connected with extreme sports due to their various contracts for advertising and sponsorship of these activities. This is likely why the Monster product lines have been able to be connected with health or performance-based products while other energy drink companies have been unable to complete this transition. Most of the success of these added products is likely due to the long-term affiliation between Monster and sports.

The original idea was that the full Monster product lineup would be made with natural juices. This might seem impossible when you look at where the product has ended up, but actually, a lot of the companies making energy drinks originally wanted to use all-natural ingredients in their drinks. The other reason that Hansen wanted to use fruit juice for their creations was that they were already in the business of making fruit juice-based products and had these resources readily available due to their other product lines.

While Monster did not end up being made with natural fruit juice, that did not impact its popularity. This is one of the most recognizable energy drink products for good reason, despite its relatively short life span. The combination of relatable and zany ads and a product that appealed to people of various ages for energy and a pick-me-up proved highly effective. This huge departure from healthy juice-based drinks might have seemed crazy, but it really delivered for Hansen right away.

The Monster Energy product is a sponsor of Bellator MMA, the Ultimate Fighting Championship, MotoGP, BMX, Motocross, Motorcycle Speedway sports, skateboarding, snowboarding, and NASCAR. Monster also sponsors the FIA World Rallycross drivers, the PBR: Unleash the Beast Professional, Bull Rider tour, the bag for golfer Tiger Woods, and the helmets of the Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 driver team.

Monster Energy is also connected with various musicians, and they host various different concert series each year with headliners like Fetty Wap, Iggy Azalea, Machine Gun Kelly, Korn, and Five Finger Death Punch. The music scene is where the brand has focused a lot of effort in recent years, with good results.

Monster has also attracted a lot of attention for being willing to sue anyone who might infringe on their use of the letter M for their logo and any reference to the slogan that can be related to their, “unleash the beast” slogan. There have been many other brewing companies and businesses that are not within the food industry which have been forced to head to court to defend their use of a similar product slogan or logo.

Monster Energy products have also been linked with all kinds of concerns about the health of those who consume these products. Other major names like Red Bull have also been tarred and feathered by those concerned about the ingredients of these products and what they can do to your health over time.

There have been studies that have shown that energy drinks can be very dangerous to people’s health when mixed with other substances like alcohol or prescription medications. There is also a chance that those with heart conditions might be impacted negatively by drinking these products as well. The swirl of controversy about the health of energy drinks has barely slacked off since the early days of these products being on the market. 

Other controversies have plagued the Monster Energy drink brand for years, one of the strangest of these being that the brand is really promoting the devil. This is due to the shape of the claw marks on the cans and also due to the dark and rather mysterious nature of the lettering and the marketing branding that the company has selected.

Monster has stated that their slogan, “Unleash the beast”, has nothing to do with devil worship or any other form of occult practices, but there are still those who believe that this is the ultimate reason for the marketing and branding choices that the company has selected. There has even been a Snopes article debunking this popular myth.

Flavors

• Original – black can with green logo
• Zero Sugar- black can with blue logo
• Ultra – White can with silver logo which is also zero sugar
• Ultra Fiesta – Mango flavored and zero sugar, this version comes in a blue can with a silver logo
• The Doctor – yellow can

Additional Products:

• Zero Ultra
• Juice products
• Hydro
• Extra Strength Monster
• Dragon Tea
• Muscle
• Import
• Rehab
• Soda mixers: Tonic, Ginger Ale, Club Soda

Caffeine Content

Most of the drinks in this lineup are made with 10 mg/oz of caffeine. This means that you will get 160 mg out of a 16 oz can. There is a warning label on every can which states that drinking more than 48oz of these products a day is not recommended. Monster is also not recommended for pregnant women or those who are sensitive to caffeine. 

Ingredients:

From the Brookshire’s entry to buy the drink products online:

• Glucose
• Taurine
• Panax ginseng extract
• l-Carnitine
• Caffeine
• Glucuronolactone
• Inositol
• Guarana extract
• Maltodextrin
• Caffeine from All Sources: 80 mg per 8 fl. oz. serving (160 mg per can)

Energy drinks were originally allowed to skirt some of the regulations about their recipes by calling the ingredients list, “supplement facts”. This is a category that is used for items that are health-based in nature or which meet certain requirements for health supplements and vitamins. The energy drink lineup does not meet these standards and has since been told that they cannot use this terminology when advertising their products.

Today, the labels say, “nutrition facts”, and there have been some adjustments to the ingredients in keeping with this change. This allowed for those who want to promote a healthier energy drink product to require that Monster disclose some of the health risks associated with consuming their products on a regular basis. At the time that energy drinks first hit the market, ginseng, taurine, and guarana were new ingredients that were not categorized correctly. Since the rise of the popularity of the energy drink, the FDA has been able to make alterations to the requirements surrounding the inclusion of these ingredients in products that are sold in the US.

Nutrition

Serving Size:	8 fl oz (240g)	% Daily Value*
Amount Per Serving
Calories	149
Total Fat	0g	0%
Saturated Fat	0g	0%
Trans Fat	0g
Polyunsaturated Fat	0g
Monounsaturated Fat	0g
Cholesterol	0mg	0%
Sodium	115mg	5%
Total Carbohydrates	36g	12%
Dietary Fiber	0g	0%
Sugars	33g
Protein	1g
Vitamin D	0mcg	0%
Calcium	0mg	0%
Iron	0mg	0%
Potassium	24mg	1%
Caffeine	91.2mg

• The % Daily Value (DV) tells you how much a nutrient in a serving of food contributes to a daily diet. 2000 calories a day is used for general nutrition advice.

Logo

The Monster energy logo is one of the most well-known and recognizable logos in this market space. You can’t miss this kind of design because it is large, bold, and really aggressive in nature. The design was made by McLean Design which is a big firm in California. The intention was that the “M” was made to look like a monster had ripped it into the can with its claws. A lot of people just see the claw marks and don’t really associate the image with the letter M, but the messaging is still effective.

All of the various different flavors of this drink are made with the same logo. The only difference is the background colors of the cans. The “M” is much less obvious on certain can colors, but it is still there.

Pictures

Commercials

A Monster Energy Zero Sugar ad:

A 2022 ad:

Monster’s countdown for best action sports moments:

FAQ