Monster Energy is the Red Bull You've Never Heard Of

Do you know about the OTHER marketing behemoth in the energy drinks industry?

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So

Neela 🌶️

has been hearing about the Red Bull marketing case study for years, and she’s quite frankly bored with it. I get it, we marketers love a good case study, and when we find one, we tend to run it into the ground, repeating the results without really focusing on how those results were achieved.

As a result, we all know that Red Bull is a marketing juggernaut. We all know that for the past decade or more, Red Bull has leveraged savvy marketing, especially when it comes to content and events, to position itself at the top of the energy drinks space. We all know that Red Bull is the undisputed leader when it comes to energy drinks, and that the Austrian company dominates the category.

Except…they don’t. In fact, in some key energy drink sales categories, Red Bull isn’t even the leader.

Meet Monster Energy, That ‘Other’ Energy Drink Marketing Juggernaut

First, let’s get a lay of the land when it comes to the energy drinks category:

Overall sales of the energy drinks category was $14.1 Billion in 2023, an increase of 14.6% over 2022 sales. The category is on fire.

Red Bull is the sales leader in the category, with $5.34 Billion in sales in 2023, up 9.3% over 2022 numbers. Monster was in 2nd place with $3.85 Billion in sales, up 12.1% over 2022 numbers. In the US market, Monster has actually passed Red Bull on sales volume (ounces of product sold), having 43% of that market, compared to 27% for Red Bull. Red Bull sells at a higher cost per ounce, which is why they can move less product and still have higher sales than Monster. Regardless of how you break down the numbers, the energy drink category as a whole is hotter than August, with Red Bull and Monster being the two dominant players.

How Does Monster’s Marketing Differ From Red Bull’s?

At a macro level, it really doesn’t.

Red Bull doesn’t sell energy drinks, it sells what happens after you drink them. Red Bull’s content and marketing focuses on the athletes and events they engage in. Red Bull creates content around these athletes, their amazing accomplishments and the events they participate in. Red Bull’s content is all about inspiring you to become more active, to push the edges, and see how Red Bull can help take you there.

Monster does the same thing, but in a slightly different way. Monster also focuses heavily on athletes and extreme sporting events, but they don’t focus on creating content around these events as much as Red Bull does.

Instead, Monster goes all in on immersing the brand at the events themselves. They focus on engaging directly with customers on-site, at the events.

The direct interaction Monster has with customers via events lets the brand position itself in a slightly different way. Whereas Red Bull aligns more with athletes and lets that drive brand building, Monster positions itself as more of a lifestyle brand. Tactics like leveraging the Monster Girls at events helps the brand reach a younger demographic and gives the brand an edgier feel that helps it differentiate from Red Bull in the eyes of customers.

When is the Last Time You Saw a Monster Energy Commercial?

I’m not sure I’ve seen one in my life. That’s intentional, as Monster all but ignores traditional marketing channels.

Marianne Radley, Monster’s Senior VP of Marketing, explains why:

“We’re very hesitant about doing interviews for no other reason than focusing on building the brand one can at a time with intimate consumer connections. Our marketing has always been very below the line. We’re mindful of that, so we try to keep our time with the press minimal just so it doesn’t look like we’re pushing so much in your face. Everything we do is genuine and sincere, and we try to keep that for all points of communication.”

Which makes sense, when you realize that Monster’s target demo is the highly desired 18-34 male segment. This group is notoriously immune to traditional marketing messages, and it takes creative tactics to get and hold their attention. Which is a big reason why Monster prefers to go all-in on events. Being immersed in events allows Monster to engage directly with the 18-34 male demo in an environment where they will be focused and paying attention. These customers have highly tuned bullshit sensors when it comes to traditional marketing. Note that Ms Radley said the brand is very cautious about not being ‘in your face’ when it comes to their marketing efforts. That speaks directly to understanding who their customers are, and how to connect with them.

What Can You Learn From Monster Energy?

It’s rare to find a category with not one, but two dominant players who are also generating noteworthy marketing campaigns as Monster Energy and Red Bull are doing for energy drinks. This marketing battle reminds me a bit of how well Patagonia and The North Face are doing in the outerwear category, and Jack just had an excellent writeup on that battle, which you will enjoy.

First, let’s focus on the commonality of Red Bull and Monster’s marketing efforts: Both brands focus less on the product itself, and more on what happens as a result or related to the product.

Paid subscribers will remember I talked about how to create engaging content at every stage of the buyer’s journey earlier this month. In that detailed breakdown, I talked about how content experiences that focus less on the product are for the beginning of the buyer’s journey.

Red Bull’s content focuses on the athletes and the amazing feats they can do. That content is focused more on Unaware customers. It’s great for building brand awareness. It’s great for getting customers interested in the extreme sports category as a whole.

Monster’s marketing prioritizes the extreme sporting events themselves. Which means Monster is after the Slightly Aware customer who is just learning about extreme sports, and is maybe attending their first such event. If you think about it, Monster’s marketing kinda piggy-backs off Red Bull’s efforts: Red Bull creates content to help drive people to the extreme events, where Monster has a presence to connect with them directly. Not sure if this is intentional, or just a happy accident, as Bob Ross would say!

In short, if you want to create amazing marketing to new customers, talk less about your product, and more about the customer and how they would use your product. If you want to create amazing marketing to existing customers, help them better understand how to use your product, and how it could improve their lives. Notice both Monster Energy and Red Bull follow this criteria quite well. As you begin to evaluate the marketing efforts of other companies (including your own), think about how the interplay between the customer and how the customer could use the product is addressed. Is the marketing only focused on selling the product, or is it focusing on the ‘bigger, cooler thing’ that the product is a part of?

That’s a wrap for this free issue of Backstage Pass, there will be another issue for Paid subscribers on Thursday. Next Monday, I will do my monthly recap post on what happened with my Substack in August. It will mark 90 days of publishing on Substack, so we should start to have some beefier takeaways.

Until then, have a great Monday!

Mack