Realtree Outdoor Energy Arctic Ice Review

Realtree, from what I gather, is an outdoors apparel company that is upfront about people licensing the use of the name and brand for whatever reason. As such I found everything from cell phone cases to beard trimmers to even vehicles and boats bearing the Realtree logo and brand. So then I guess I shouldn't be surprised that they also offer energy drinks, but I am. Why? Because there aren't just one or two different generic kinds of the energy drink...there are 7! Unfortunately for me, the WalMart I was at only carried 3 of them at the time, but oh well, better try 3 than none...amirite?

Taste

Without reading the label or anything about this drink online, I honestly expected Arctic Ice to be sugar free and have that sharp citrus note with a bit of a peppery burn. Oh boy...I could not have been more wrong. Arctic Ice is blue and tastes like a very, very sweet blue raspberry soda. Like....very, very sweet soda and the label confirmed it, indicating the presence of 56 grams of sugar. I cannot stress enough how sweet this drink is. It is so sweet I had to pause for 5 minutes every 1/3 of the can. A bit of water certainly helped bring the sweetness down a notch. I mean, a can of this stuff is 20% of your recommended daily intake of carbs! I know Coke has a lot of sugar, but it does not taste as sweet as this stuff.

Reading the label, I also discovered that this drink is essentially water, corn syrup, coloring, caffeine and preservatives. Very American if I am being honest.

Energy

The one thing this label does not indicate is how much caffeine is in the can, but a short internet search revealed that there are 80 mg of caffeine per serving. Applying some basic math, we get that there are 160 mg of caffeine per can since there are 2 servings. That's actually what I expected since the rule of thumb is 160mg/473 mL.

Since there is so much sugar in this drink, the jitters are strong, come in quick and stay for a loooong time. But once the caffeine kicks, you get that too-much-energy feeling for a few hours and then it dies off. In my case, since I had this first thing in the morning after a good sleep, I experienced a very mild crash that I can probably chalk up to just being tired from lunch.

Scores:
Cost - $3 from WalMart
Taste - 7/10
Energy - 8/10

Overall - 15/20...very, very sweet with a sugary rush