When one makes a claim as significant as Vital Pharmaceuticals (also known as VPX Sports), who states that their energy drink Bang can “reverse mental retardation,” one better have some serious proof to back that up. According to Monster Energy Corp., VPX Sports is simply selling snake oil.
The energy drink titans could clash in courtlater this year, according to The Miami Herald. Monster recently filed a lawsuit against VPX Sports, stating that the company uses deceptive marketing and advertising to sell their Bang energy drinks.
Monster’s suit also targets Jack Owoc, CEO, CSO (Chief Scientific Officer) ,and founder of VPX Sports Nutrition. As stated on the VPX website, Owoc’s mission is “to make the highest qualitynutritional supplements on the market, backed by scientific research.”
In a June 2017 YouTube video, Owoc claimed that “exciting research” proves Bang “helps with all forms of dementia, including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, and other forms of dementia.”
Owoc and VPX credit their patented “Super Creatine” compound in aiding these neurological conditions. The Mayo Clinic states that creatine, used in energy production, is a naturally occurring amino acid located in your muscles and brain, and is produced by organs like the liver, pancreas, and kidneys.
Synthetic creatine is often ingested to improve athletic performance and can be taken to promote brain health. But no published scientific evidence suggests creatine can and does reversebrain diseases.
[fm_youtube url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hYcTX9jYr0&feature=youtu.be"]On top of their deceptive marketing claim, Monster is also suing VPX Sports for violating California unfair competition laws, false advertising, and “trade libel that ‘disparage’ energy drink companies like Monster,” the Herald reports.
Monster’s lawyer, Marc Miles, has also looked into Owoc’s credentials and found that “his qualifications seem to be based exclusively on his previous stint as a high school science teacher.”
Miles, who is hoping for a juried trial, states via Monster’s suit, “Even if Bang could deliver [its] promised benefits, which again it does not, the ingredients at the heart of [VPX’s] claims — Super Creatine are sprinkled into Bang in such low amounts that none of the purported benefits could ever be delivered through safe consumption of Bang.”
VPX Sports also produces Redline, an energy drink which, in 2008, sentfour middle school students to the hospital with rapid heart rates and body sweats.
Although Owoc wrote on the VPX website that he wanted to run his company like “a pharmaceutical company and adhere closer to their higher standards,” Monster believes he is missing the mark by a long shot. It will be interesting to see how this case plays out if and when it goes to trial.
