With every new invention the public latches onto, new markets open up with innovative products to tempt the consumer. For instance, soon after the birth of the Automobile, people were creating all sorts of automobile products and accessories. It sure did not take long after the birth of Pokemon before an industry around RPG card playing games would be in full swing. It is the heart of capitalism. Find what the latest trend is, latch onto it, tweak it around so it is just different enough to stand out but not different enough not to stand apart – and ride the popularity wave for as long as you can. After all, that Is why I am even able to be writing on this internets device at all.

The same is true for the caffeine craze – in that people from all walks of life are looking for the new popularity of caffeine as their bread-and-butter. The market is waning enough that just coming out with an energy drink will not do, as the market is flooded with them. So innovators are turning to more unique ideas to try to ride that wave.

For a while, that wave was in little 2 ounce bottles, as convenience stores were strewn with little bottles promising 5,6 and now 8 hours of energy. But that market has also gotten flooded. And right around the horizon is the next Big Thing which seems to be taking over, caffeinated tablets and powders – crystallized forms of energy drinks just begging to be the next thing dropped in your bottle of water.

This is a great thing for a hard working company. Powders and tablets last longer, are easier to transport and store – and MUCH less expensive to produce. If a company can corner this market the same way that 5 Hour Energy did on energy shots, they could make a mint.

Eboost energy is trying their hand at this with a ridiculously healthy powder meant to be mixed with 8 ounces of water. Eboost is trying to cash in on the Emergen-c market, making a vitamin enriched energy drink powder that will please the health conscious consumer who won’t get into energy drink. This comes in 2 decent flavors, an orange and pink lemonade, and is supposed to be lightly carbonated.

Packaging:8
Unfortunately for Eboost, their cool arrow logo has been swiped by Target – enough that I might even see a lawsuit in the works. The Target brand is one of the retailer’s top five largest private brands, and Kathee Tesija, executive vice president of merchandising for Target, said Up & Up has been about a year and a half in the making. so it could just be one of those happy coincidences – but it would be very amusing to see Eboost sold there.

That being said – this is a lovely clean foil pouch, one where they understand their limited space, and therefore only put on the things they need – like the nutrition label, a little drawing of instructions (in case you thought you were to snort the thing) and some cute bubbles to pull the design off. The pink variety differs, mainly because from even just seeing the color of the package would immediately tell you, has the tell-tale pink ribbons on it – letting you know that not all your well spent money is just going to carbonated powder research. I think it is great that this company is giving back to a good cause while promoting pink grapefruits as well. I would have appreciated knowing the caffeine amount with everything else though.

Taste:8
For having 2 flavors and nearly the same ingredients, the flavor does vary quite a bit from the pink to the orange. Both are remarkably good – dissolving in seconds in a glass of water, without leaving much residue either on the top of the glass or floating round at the bottom – with one or two slight problems.
They both taste a bit chalky – I am sure due to the green tea used for caffeine, and the pink variety is sweetened with the stevia plant. Still, if you go into it expecting a bit more sour than your average plant leaf you’ll be just fine.
The other problem I noticed is that for all the flavor of baking soda in here, there really is not enough carbonation. I expected after watching my water explode in a froth of orange and pink that this would have the bubbly power of a Powerpuff Girl, but it just wasn’t there. And that is the problem with powders – finding a way to be very fizzy without making everything taste like Arm and Hammer. The bubbles were barely there in all my samples – and if you let the drink sit open for 10 minutes, the carbonation stops immediately.

Nutrition/Buzz:9
Now this is where this product shines. Their website lists each packet as having as much caffeine as a cup of coffee, so we might gather it has around 100 or so milligrams of caffeine. And it does provide a very nice boost. While I was not flying around the room on the stuff, it was a good stand in for my morning cup of coffee.
And as for the nutrition, Watch out. First, the caffeine is from Green Tea, so it has those lovely catechins to work as an antioxidant. This also has a ton of vitamin C and B, plus Zinc, selenium, copper, chromium and potassium for your electrolytes. The energy blend is full of stuff even I have never heard of (all natural, but still, if you could stump me with energy building ingredients, bully for you), such as 5-htp, huperzine-a, vinpocetine and astragalus root extract. And did you read where the pink grapefruit is sweetened with stevia? Overall, pretty impressive stuff.

SO will this be the one to take over this sub-category? Well, if something as poor tasting and cheese-ball as 5 hour energy could dominate the shot category, this one would be refreshing to see dominate convenience store counters instead.