Prime hit $1.2B on founder hype, then lost 70% in the UK.
Logan Paul and KSI sold Prime to their audiences from January 2022. Sales grew 4.8x in a year, then fell once the novelty did.
BLOOM10X did not work with Prime Hydration. This breakdown uses public sources only, linked below.
- Jan 2022Launch video on Logan Paul’s channel
- Jul 2022Arsenal’s official hydration partner
- 2022$250M in first-year sales
- Feb 2023Big Game ad, starring the founders
- 2023About $1.2B in sales
- Q1 2024UK sales down 50% year on year
- 2024UK turnover down 70.7%, US down 40% in H1
Hype buys a first purchase.
Four plays that worked, one that broke.
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Turn a rivalry into a launch
Logan Paul and KSI had fought each other in the ring. Prime launched with “I Started A Drink Company With KSI” on Logan’s channel on Jan 9, 2022: “After years of heated rivalry, we’re humbled & honored to bring you Prime Hydration.” It has 8.2M views (YouTube).
Copy this: launch with a story your audience already follows. A founder video with a reason to watch beats a product reveal.
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Let scarcity do the selling
Aldi stocked Prime as a one-off in December 2022 at £1.99; restocks drew queues and resale listings (BBC, Jan 2023). Tesco limited buyers to three bottles and resale hit £1,200 (Fortune, Apr 2024). KSI said limiting supply was never the plan.
Copy this: release in small, dated drops to a waitlist. Plan the restock before the hype fades, not after.
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Borrow trust from sports
Prime became Arsenal’s official hydration partner in July 2022 (Arsenal) and FC Bayern’s official isotonic partner in August 2023 (FC Bayern). Its Big Game ad names it “the official sports drink of the UFC.”
Copy this: at a smaller budget, sponsor local teams, gyms or race events your buyers already trust, and put the logo on the pack.
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Make the founders the ad
The 30-second Big Game spot from February 2023 is Logan and KSI on camera, with the claim “the fastest growing sports drink in history.” Logan’s upload calls it “the first creator owned Big Game commercial” (YouTube).
Copy this: put the founder in the first three seconds of your best ads. Faces people know stop the scroll.
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Where it broke: trial without repeat
Numerator put the US drop down to fewer new buyers, less frequent buying and lower spend per unit. In the UK, turnover fell 70.7% and the board announced a strategic review (Business Insider, Marketing Week, Jun 2025). A supplier’s lawsuit blamed “fading social media buzz.”
Avoid this: don’t read sell-outs as demand. Track how many first buyers come back within 60 days before you add stores.
Two years up, two years down.
Global sales
UK company, 2023 vs 2024
“We have this thing called the cell phone that lets us reach every corner of the globe.”
A 30-second ad made of two founders.
Our wireframe of “Prime’s Big Game Commercial,” built from its transcript and timings.
- 1Who, not whatIt opens on the founders: “We have created our own drink company.”
- 2A growth claim as proof“The fastest growing sports drink in history.” Momentum stands in for a benefit.
- 3The showThe pair carry the middle of the spot like a fight-night intro.
- 4Borrowed authority“The official sports drink of the UFC.”
- 5A taste beat, lastThe only product moment is the closing sip: “Oh, that’s good.”
Logan Paul’s YouTube, video ebha0MzwtU8, Feb 12, 2023, 1.3M views on Nov 10, 2026. Transcript is YouTube’s auto-generated English track.
“Buy now” sends you to another store.
- 1The header button leaves the site“Buy PRIME” on the homepage links to Prime’s Amazon store.
- 2No price above the foldThe page lists a 12-pack at $19.99 in its data, but the mobile view shows name and buttons first.
- 3Buy nowThe one checkout path on the page, with Affirm offered on orders over $35.
- 4Find in store, same sizeRetail gets an equal button, a sign of where most bottles sell.
- 5Claims as icons10% coconut water, electrolytes, zero added sugar, no artificial dyes, caffeine-free.
Seven product lines
Hydration, Zero Hydration, Shake, Energy, Rapid Rehydration, Hydration+ Sticks and Shake + Creatine. The Shake runs a Pop-Tarts flavor, linked to Target.
New lines and licensed flavors chase new buyers once the first wave stops buying.
“Fuel your inbox!”
The popup asks for name, email and phone for “product updates and exclusive PRIME content.”
No discount, no sample, no reason to buy today.
“Verify your PRIME”
A main-menu page where buyers pick their country first, from a long list of flags.
We found no Meta ads from Prime.
A US Ad Library search for “PRIME Hydration” returned about 76 ads. None we saw came from Prime’s page; most came from Prime IV, an unrelated IV therapy chain.
The launch and the Big Game ad.
Prime has no official YouTube channel we could find. Both videos are on co-founder Logan Paul’s channel.
Read it with four caveats.
- Not a DTC brand. Prime sells through grocers and Amazon as well as its own site. Lessons on retail velocity don’t map one to one onto a Shopify store.
- Two of the biggest creators alive. Logan Paul had 23.5M YouTube subscribers, per Fortune in 2024. A smaller brand can borrow the play, not the reach.
- Kids were a big part of the audience. Fortune tied the hype to Gen Alpha. Selling to minors brings scrutiny a small brand can’t absorb.
- Clipping: fan channels repost founder moments, such as a 31-second KSIClips Short with 158K views (YouTube). We found no public evidence that Prime runs or pays for clips, so we treat this as weak.
- What we’d change: a subscribe-and-save offer and a reason to join the email list. Prime’s popup offers content, not a habit.
Six moves, and one to avoid.
- Launch with a founder video that has a story, not a product reveal. Creative
- Release in dated drops to a waitlist, with the restock planned. Retention
- Put the founder or a known face in the first three seconds of ads. Hook rate guide
- Run creator posts as partnership ads so they keep working. Partnership ads guide
- Give the email popup a reason to buy today. Conversion
- Track 60-day repeat rate before adding stores or flavors. LTV calculator
- Avoid this: reading a sell-out as long-term demand. CAC calculator
Where every number comes from.
- Sasha Rogelberg, “The meteoric rise and stunning fall of Prime, Logan Paul’s energy drink that was once resold for almost $1,500 a can,” Fortune, Apr 27, 2024 (cites Bloomberg, Nov 8, 2023, for 2023 sales; The Grocer and NielsenIQ for Q1 2024 UK sales). fortune.com
- Kim Bhasin, “Logan Paul and KSI’s Prime Drinks Are Set to Surpass $1.2 Billion in Sales,” Bloomberg, Nov 8, 2023 (paywalled; figure read via Fortune). bloomberg.com
- Manish Pandey, “Prime drink: How KSI and Logan Paul made it so popular,” BBC Newsbeat, Jan 27, 2023 (updated Apr 18, 2023). bbc.co.uk
- Josh Stephenson, “Prime profits fall by over 90% as sales continue to plummet,” Marketing Week, Jun 24, 2025 (Companies House accounts). marketingweek.com
- Madeline Berg and Dan Whateley, “Logan Paul’s Prime sales plummet in a key market,” Business Insider, Jun 24, 2025 (Numerator US data, vendor lawsuits). businessinsider.com
- Arsenal, “Arsenal partners with PRIME hydration drink,” Jul 27, 2022. arsenal.com
- FC Bayern, “FC Bayern Munich announces PRIME Hydration as official isotonic partner,” Aug 10, 2023. fcbayern.com
- Logan Paul, “I Started A Drink Company With KSI,” YouTube, Jan 9, 2022, and “Logan Paul & KSI, Prime’s Big Game Commercial,” Feb 12, 2023; views and transcript seen Nov 10, 2026. youtube.com · youtube.com
- PRIME, homepage, Ice Pop product page and Verify Your PRIME page, viewed Nov 10, 2026. drinkprime.com
- Meta Ad Library, US exact-phrase search for “PRIME Hydration,” viewed Nov 10, 2026. facebook.com/ads/library
- KSIClips, “KSI & Logan Paul Reveal How Much PRIME Has Made,” YouTube Short, views seen Nov 10, 2026. youtube.com
