Costco Aspire Energy Drink with Natural Caffeine Review

In my university days, I loved energy drinks and drank them regularly. For the last ten years or so though, my favorite and only source of caffeine has been coffee. I never drink energy drinks anymore. Coffee may not be great for you, but at least it’s a natural substance! With that being said, I was intrigued when I saw these Aspire drinks at Costco – the idea of a green tea-based energy drink with natural caffeine seems smart. Could this be a healthier alternative to traditional energy drinks?

If energy drinks aren’t your thing and you prefer to get your caffeine from coffee like I do, you may want to try some coffees from Costco. I’ve reviewed Salt Spring Coffee, Starbucks Limited Edition Fall Coffee Beans, Starbucks Winter Blend Coffee, Ethical Bean Coffee Lush Medium Dark Roast, Level Ground East Africa Dark Roast, Zavida Hazelnut Vanilla Flavored Coffee and Starbucks French Roast Coffee Beans.

Location in Store

You can find this in the drink section at Costco (on the side wall of the store). The item number is 1716083.

Taste

None of these drinks are overly sweet or strongly flavored. I was surprised by that when I had my first taste. They all smell great too! I tried each flavor and wrote notes on what I thought of them.

Raspberry + Açai – I’ll admit, I can’t remember what açai berries taste like! The raspberry flavor is noticeable, but you can taste the açai as well (or at least something that’s not raspberry).

Mango Lemonade – This one just tastes like a mild mango drink. There is some tartness too, but it didn’t taste like lemonade to me.

Sweet Cherry – This one was the sweetest and most artificial-tasting to me. The other two were also a bit artificial-tasting, but not to the same degree. Still, it’s not bad. It definitely has a cherry flavor.

Overall, these drinks are pretty tasty considering they’re sugar-free and zero-calorie. The flavors might be a bit artificial, but not to the point where they’re not enjoyable. I’m not a big energy drink person these days, but I can see myself drinking the rest of the cans here and there over the summer.

Cost

The case of 12 drinks costs $19.99 Canadian which isn’t cheap but a single energy drink at the convenience store costs two to four dollars.

Convenience

The best-before date is almost two years from the date we purchased them and each can is 355 milliliters. The box has three flavors, sweet cherry, mango lemonade and raspberry acai. The mango is my favorite.

These are great if you’re looking for caffeine but don’t like coffee or most of the energy drinks available due to their artificial taste and ingredients list.

Nutrition

Calories

A 355 ml can contains zero calories, zero grams of fat, carbohydrates, protein and sodium and zero grams of sugar. They’re sweetened with sucralose instead of sugar.

Ingredients

The natural caffeine is green coffee bean, green tea and guarana seed. Also, taurine which is the second ingredient is a natural stimulant. The Aspire drinks also have a bunch of different vitamins in them like vitamins B5, B12 and others so if you’re already supplementing you may want to consider this. The natural caffeine in these is nice because a lot of other energy drinks usually contain synthetic caffeine, which is produced using harsh chemicals.

Scoring

Taste: 8/10 (+1 for tasting this good while having no sugar or calories!)

Cost: 7/10

Convenience: 10/10

Nutrition: Not applicable. I have no idea whether these energy drinks are any better for you than something like Red Bull.

Overall

Give it a try!

If you’re someone who gravitates towards energy drinks and wants to try one with zero sugar and natural caffeine, I recommend picking these up. They’re tasty. I’ll finish my case, but I’m not really that excited about energy drinks in general so I won’t repurchase them.

Have you tried the Aspire energy drinks from Costco? What did you think of them?

Please note that this review was not paid for or sponsored by any third party. This product was purchased by Costcuisine for the purpose of producing this review. The opinions in this review are strictly those of Costcuisine. Costcuisine is not affiliated with Costco or any of its suppliers. In the event that Costcuisine receives compensation for a post from the manufacturer of a product or some other third party, the arrangement will be clearly disclosed (including where the manufacturer of a product provides Costcuisine with a free sample of the product).