What happens when you come out with an energy drink marketed as an aphrodisiac, leave out a serious dose of caffeine, pump in a tiny bit of herbal powder that has supposed aphrodisiac qualities and fill the rest up with carrot juice? The answer is easy. Old Expired Cans of Failure.

This can happen to the best of brands, where even the mighty Hansen’s has seen its share of ECF. There are lessons to be learned from it though, in that you need a quality product that people WANT to buy and be able to get that product into their hands consistent. If you turn out junk, design unappealing packages and can’t get it into consumers mitts – you are going to have ten thousand dollars of crap sitting on a palette in a lonely loading dock. Not many drinks survive the rest of time and turn a real profit. It can be done, but the road is very hard – and unenviable. Learn from past examples so you can do better. Herbn Love could be a great lesson in what NOT do do for your flagship product.

Herbn Love was a tasty aphrodisiac drink made by Natrient. They put together a nice subtle flavored “all natural aphrodisiac”. The drink had a light vanilla flavor with a mild herbal finish. It tastes much more like juice than anything else , probably because of the lack of carbonation, coupled with the very natural and fruity flavor. “We set out to create a powerful formula utilizing the most universally recognized aphrodisiac herbs and transform it into a delicious liquid experience” said Dr. Josh Dembicer, who along with partner Ira Josephs co-founded HerbnTonics, LLC.

So they got this great tasting drink, but left out one important thing. Caffeine. It had some in there, but the amount was pretty low – enough that most people would not notice. So even though this thing had Muira-Puama Bark, Astragalus Root, Rose Hips, Vanilla Bean, Orange Peel and Jasmine Petals, it was not enough to get anyone feeling sexed up or full of energy. And without energy, who is going to buy this stuff? Bars won’t as most of them would not touch this. Red Bull has contracts with them anyways so they could not buy them if they wanted to. Porn shops maybe, but they have this plain purple can that looks about as sexy as an trance electronica CD. Very cool and futuristic, but certainly not sexy.

And what do you get when you have a poorly formulated drink with the wrong package and a niche market hard to get into stores? Old Expired Cans of Failure.

If you still want some of these ( as they still really do taste good – even though they might need to be dusted first), Drake at beverageboutique.com still might have some cases left for you to buy. And as for the company – Ira has given up drinks in favor of little energy pills – going after a whole different crowd of energy consumers ( I’ve never reviewed energy supplement pills before – so stay tuned..)