Bawls facts for kids
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| Type | Soft drink |
|---|---|
| Manufacturer | Solvi Acquisition |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Introduced | November 1996 |
| Flavor | Citrus and cream soda |
| Ingredients | Guarana |
| Variants |
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Bawls (also known as BAWLS Guarana) is a special kind of soft drink that contains caffeine. It's known for its unique flavor and cool-looking bottle!
This drink was first made in 1996. It tastes like a mix of citrus fruit and cream soda. The energy boost comes from the guarana berry, which grows in the Amazon rainforest. Bawls comes in cool blue bottles and cans with a bumpy texture. It quickly became popular with gamers, and the company started marketing it to them a lot. Even today, Bawls is still sold, and there are six other flavors to try!
Contents
The Story of Bawls: How It Started
In 1994, a student named Hobart C. Buppert III was traveling in Vienna, Austria. He noticed that people at clubs were buying expensive, highly caffeinated drinks made from guarana beans. Hobart didn't like coffee, but he saw a great idea in these guarana drinks. He thought he could make a better version!
So, in 1996, Hobart took out a loan to start his company, Hobarama, in Miami Beach, Florida. That November, he launched his first product: Bawls Guarana. This new soft drink had three times more caffeine than regular Coca-Cola Classic! Bawls became popular because it had lots of caffeine, used natural ingredients, and had a fun, unique idea behind it. By 1998, Bawls was popular in nightclubs and was starting to appear in grocery stores in the US and Europe.
Over the years, the company faced some challenges and changed hands. By 2012, the company was doing better and even bought out some other drink brands. In 2014, Jon Gunnerson became the CEO, and the company moved its offices to Ohio.
Later, other energy drinks like Monster Energy and Rockstar became very popular. These new drinks took away some of Bawls' customers, even among gamers. In 2022, a company called Solvi Acquisition was making Bawls.
What's in Bawls?
Taste and Ingredients
People often describe Bawls as tasting like a citrus-flavored cream soda. Its caffeine comes from the guarana berry, which grows in the Amazon rainforest.
Back in 2002, a 12-ounce bottle of Bawls had about 80 milligrams of caffeine. In 2004, a 10-ounce bottle had as much caffeine as about 1.5 cups of coffee! The ingredients and where the guarana came from stayed the same since 1996.
Cool Packaging
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In 2003, Bawls got its special blue bottles from Germany and the bottle caps from Ecuador. The drink was then bottled in New Jersey with guarana from Brazil. The company's founder said the raised bumps on the bottles were meant to look like "bouncing balls inside the bottle punching their way out."
In 2006, Bawls also started making cans. They wanted the cans to feel as unique as the bumpy bottles. So, they worked with Crown Beverage Packaging to create aluminum cans that used a new technology called "foaming ink." This ink swells when heated, giving the cans a bumpy surface similar to the bottles!
Marketing Bawls to Gamers
By 2002, Bawls was really focusing on gamers. About half of the people who bought Bawls were gamers, usually young men. That year, the company sponsored 2500 LAN parties, which are events where gamers bring their computers to play together.
To reach more gamers, stores like CompUSA started selling Bawls. From 2004 to at least 2008, Bawls was featured at the Penny Arcade Expo, a huge gaming convention. Bawls also partnered with GameFly in 2008 to offer discounts to each other's customers. In 2014, Bawls was still marketed to gamers and even sponsored QuakeCon 2014, where thousands of gallons of the drink were consumed!
What's in a Name?
The name "Bawls" has a few stories behind it. In 1998, the founder, Hobart Buppert, said the name meant "a state of mind" and that it was a slang term for being "bold and daring." He thought it would be hard for people to forget a product called Bawls Guarana.
In 2002, a newspaper reported that BAWLS was short for "Brazilian American Wildlife Society," which was meant to promote using the rainforest in a good way. However, another story from 2004 said the name came from a friend's joke. Later, in 2015, a CEO of the company said the name was about "bouncing like a ball" and giving you energy.
Bawls in Games and Shows
Bawls has even appeared in video games and TV shows!
- In 2002, Bawls was a special item in the video game Run Like Hell. The main character could drink Bawls from vending machines to get more health.
- In the 2004 game Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel, Bawls replaced the game's usual fictional drink, Nuka-Cola. Some fans weren't happy about this change!
- Bawls has also been seen in popular TV shows like The Big Bang Theory and Silicon Valley.
Sponsorships
Bawls has been the official drink for many events:
- In 2002, it was the official soft drink of the Cyberathlete Professional League, a professional gaming league.
- It was also the official energy drink for the National Professional Paintball League (in 2004 and 2006).
- Bawls even sponsored fashion events like Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week and Olympus Fashion Week in 2008.
Different Kinds of Bawls
The first new flavor of Bawls was a sugar-free version called Bawls Guaranexx, released in 2003. In 2006, Bawls teamed up with 7-Eleven to create a Bawls-flavored Slurpee called Sno Bawls.
By 2008, more Bawls flavors were available, including Bawls Cherry and Bawls Exxtra. A root beer version called G33k Beer (pronounced "Geek Beer") was launched at a Halo tournament in 2008. That year, it was even named "Energy Drink of the Year" by BevNET!
As of 2022, there were eleven different Bawls flavors and packaging types listed on their website. You could find 10-ounce bottles of Original, Zero (sugar-free), Orange, Ginger, Cherry Cola, Cherry, and Root Beer. The 16-ounce cans came in Original, Zero, Cherry, and Root Beer flavors.
