Time is a bomb like tick tick tick tick...........

So we have about a week and a dayish until we are sitting upon a mountain of beverages. Been taking the past week as a chance to hang out and soak up the last vestige of free time summer love, fighting the man and any other independent 25 year old thing I can think of! The last ingredients arrive Monday, co-packer is paid, labels are done and shipping company is ready to go. All we can do now is wait................................................

Seth of HonestTea surprised me a little with the shoulder he threw us, but take your lumps and get on with it. Weeeese.

This weekend (tomorrow) is Park Ave fest and we are planning to hand out samples. We will also start mixing Vital Energy with different booze to find the mighty mix or crazy cocktail. I have also been starting to plan our product launch party (so tell all your friends!).

Nerves, debt, no background in the industry, and a new startup. We have a lot going for us and plan to use that to our advantage. Bully.

Get ready to suck one down soon.

-J

Got back to us...

-mike

New labels and fun meetings

Big news of the week is we designed new labels and are sending them to our printing company to print 100,000 of them for our first production run! We worked with Forward branding in Webster, NY to make the label stand out more on the shelf.

We've also dropped the color names from the labels and changed orange passion to tangerine.

We're really happy with the way these have turned out!

We had a conference call setup with Seth Goldman, who started Honest Tea, but he blew us off! We've heard he's been fed up with the beverage industry after he sold out to Coke though, so he probably wouldn't have been much fun to talk to.

Met with Wright-Wisner Distribution in Rochester, NY today for over an hour and learned a lot. They were awesome and had great advice for us. We were already aware of this, but one of the points you may find interested is........

Shelf space Slotting fees (examples):

• Tops Grocery market - 7 to 9 thousand dollars per flavor for shelf space
• Convenience stores like Wilson Farms - 135 dollars per store per year (80 stores!)

Yes, you have to PAY STORES to be able to SELL TO THEM! Some of you were probably already aware of this, but it's kind of a strange concept that is almost monopolistic and certainly favors large companies and is anti-competition if you ask us!

The week has been fantastic and we are really getting excited to start selling Vital Energy in a few short weeks!!

I have a lot more to write about the past week and should post again this weekend!

-mike

Getting close... lots of news

Scottie finally updated his photo on our website so he's not sporting that ridiculous hat. He looks awfully sexy without it if you ask us.

It's been over a week since our last post, so it's time for a new entry!

The past week we have been meeting with tons of people. Some investors, some distributors, some business people, and even some stores. We've gotten plenty of advice from all of the above and have been moving up the food chain, so to speak, in terms of important contacts.

First things first, we will be making our first production run in around 3 weeks. Then we'll have it for sale online and in stores around the Rochester area. We will be focusing on local gyms, pizza shops, yoga studios, sub shops, colleges, etc. We've already talked with a few Pontillos Pizza shops and gyms and they're going to sell some Vital Energy!

Our goal is to sell our first production run by October, and then pursue distributors and grocery stores as we grow.

One huge development over the past week is the redesign of our label. So far we've designed everything ourselves because we are a startup that isn't exactly ...wealthy. We are having a marketing agency rework our label so that we stand out more on shelves and make sure that our message gets across to consumers. Namely, we are a refreshing energy drink that provides plenty of caffeine and vitamin B complexes for long lasting energy! (and it's ideal before workouts or busy days!)

We've also purchased new domain names so if you type in any of the following you will find our website...
http://www.theVitalEnergy.com
http://www.VitalEnergyDrink.com
http://www.EnertiaBeverage.com
http://www.EnertiaBev.com

Stay Tuned for our new Label design...should be ready by Monday!!!

Later kid
-Mike

Camping World Grand Prix at the Glen (Watkins Glen)

A lot has happened since we last talked. For one, the King of Pop died... as if you haven't heard enough about this. I've been listening to Billie Jean, Beat it, and Rock with You like 1,000 times. And while my iPod still had a charge, we listened to him all the way to Watkins Glen this past weekend.

We took a Vital Energy field trip to the Camping World Grand Prix at the Glen for July 4th (Indy races). None of us have ever been to a race before so we didn't know what to expect. We bought 3 General Admission tickets because they were cheap and we didn't know what Terrace, Grandstand, Pit, or Garage tickets meant.

Anyway, I had a friend who was in the Pit at Danica Patrick's pit stop. We wanted to go say hi, but we didn't have the right tickets! Sooo Jake and I made friends with the ushers at the security gate and schmoozed our way in. They were awesome ladies though, so it was easy to be friendly! Check out the fine young ladies to the right with Jake :)


When we got into the Grandstands we were able to talk to my friend in the Pit and even caught a few snapshots of Danica Patrick.

After I introduced Jake and Scott to my friend Brooke, we left to go explore the festivities around the track (the track was 3.4 miles long). We got picked up by our golf cart limo driver and then we met some Bat ladies, Erik Estrada from CHIPs, and walked by a bunch of Indy racers we didn't really know.

Jake was becoming mr. cranky pants, so he took off and took a nap in my car while Scott and I watched some Indy time trials. We decided to be risky and sneak into the Pit. This was awesome! Danica Patrick, Marco Andretti, and some other racers walked right by us. We got right up to the cars, and even walked into the garages where mechanics were working on the Indy cars.

The engines were insane looking. I took a few snapshots of Scott and the engines. We then spotted a huge line outside Danica's trailer and waited patiently with everyone. When Danica came out the first time, Scottie waved at her and she waved back at him. Scottie was smitten by the wave.

Later on, some attendees were allowed to drive their cars around the track for a lap. A guy in a white Supra came back and his car sounded horrible. When he parked, we looked at the back of it and found out what the sound was. He said he was driving down a straight part of the track and lost control...and ended up slamming into a wall (see pictures below). He was obviously a great driver.

Rock with me, And we can ride the Boogie,
RIP MJ
-Mike