Shaquille O’Neal has become a multi-million dollar businessman since his retirement from the NBA but did the former Los Angeles Lakers Center really come out with a Shaq soda?
In 2013, Shaquille O’Neal released his own line of Shaq Sodas, a cream soda beverage powered by AriZona Beverages called Soda Shaq. Instead of signing a deal with brands like Sprite, Gatorade or Coke, Shaq decided to start his brand and put his name and face on it. In addition to that, Shaq didn’t test the waters before releasing the drink and went full steam ahead by releasing four flavours at once namely, Strawberry Cream, Orange Cream, Vanilla Cream and Blueberry Cream.
Many people criticized O’Neal for creating a drink like Soda Shaq because of the large amounts of sugar each can contained and said that he was a hypocrite for saying that diabetes is deadly and then releasing a drink with so much sugar. O’Neal’s Shaq Soda was off the shelves in 2016 with no real information as to why the beverage was discontinued.
The soda must have found it difficult to find a foothold in the beverage industry with brands such as Pepsi, Coca Cola and others controlling the market. No matter how much influence Shaq has as a celebrity, without a group of celebrities and top organizations backing the product it was never going to be all that successful in the crowded beverage industry.
Although it has been discontinued for 6 years now, it seems like some fans actually miss the Shaq soda. Several online campaigns have popped up asking for the drink to be brought back to stores. In addition to that, there’s even a Twitter account dedicated to bringing back Soda Shaq called ‘Bring Back Soda Shaq’.
There are a lot of Shaq fanatics that drank the soda and want it to come back. Although the drink didn’t do very well in the market, it definitely garnered a small cult following that want it to come back.
After the apparent failure of Soda Shaq, O’Neal has not made another attempt to create his own drinks brand.
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