Sales of Booker’s budget Euro Shopper Energy Drink have soared by almost 50% in 12 months.

The drink - which costs 35p for a 250ml can - has overtaken Coca-Cola’s Powerade in The Grocer’s Top Products Survey list of the top 10 sports and energy drink brands, after adding £16.2m in sales year-on-year. Value has grown 46.2% to £51.2m [Nielsen 52 w/e 13 October 2012], while volume has risen 43.4% - equivalent to 50 million extra 250ml cans.

The performance far exceeds the 6.3% volume growth in the overall sports and energy category, while the own-label sector fell by 9.1%.

Launched in 2007 to counter the threat from discounters, sales of the Euro Shopper brand now exceeded £150m a year, Booker revealed this week - meaning that, according to Nielsen figures, Energy Drink now accounts for a third of total brand sales.

“Euro Shopper Energy Drink continues to be a great-performing product for our customers and continues to show good growth,” said a Booker spokesman. “It increases footfall into our customers’ stores and its quality drives repeat purchase.”

The Energy Drink range is price-marked and includes 250ml standard and sugar-free cans (35p), 250ml Tropical and Berries cans (39p), a standard 500ml can (69p) and a one-litre bottle (95p).

The average price of a 250ml can of energy drink is 88p [BrandView.co.uk], while the cheapest is N-Gine Blue, which launched into Tesco this summer at 25p. Although the price has since risen to 35p, it is currently being sold with ‘10p off’.

The launch of N-Gine Blue highlighted concerns about low price points in energy drinks - a fear supported by Kantar Worldpanel research, which found 86% of shoppers who bought budget drinks never traded up.

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