Hello, and welcome to Mind of Micah.

Today is Part 3 of Micah's Read of the Week, how big beverage poured empty promises

down our throat.

The American beverage aisle is overflowing with no signs of letting up.

It's from TheVox.com, it's written by Melinda Facute.

Okay, without further ado, here is Part 3.

Other so-called functional beverages tend to have softer, calmer branding that is meant

to mirror how the consumable feel drinking it, and vary from abstract to minimalist vibes.

Functional beverages, like recess, a hemp-based drink brand, were typically dressed in soothing

pastels that set them apart from the bold primary colors of a Coca-Cola or Red Bull.

Millennial focus branding with an Instagram-friendly aesthetic that targets overworked young women,

seeking out brief moments of self-care as an alternative to traditional medicine.

That's quite a sentence.

They'd sprung up, she explained, in the wake of so-called anxiety economy.

According to information from recess, sales went up 60% since the start of the pandemic,

a time in which many consumers might have felt they needed the extra help to calm down.

It's not just branding, though, the wellness buzzwords contained in each canon bottle are paramount,

even if they're not super legible to consumers, ingredients like Neutropics,

which are defined as anything that adds the brain to focus,

and Adopt Gens, which are defined as natural chemicals or herbs that help the body adapt to

stressors, have been gaining traction. There's also sugar-free zero calorie drink called

Confidence that claims to give its drinker exactly that.

...