Los Angeles Energy Drink Trip 2017 (November)

Shopping at a Relaxed Pace!

This trip to Los Angeles was a casual one, just coming for the weekend without any specific plans. There was a bit of fatigue from the flight, but I arrived at the hotel in the morning and checked in right away, so I headed out for shopping without any bags! The feeling of being light on my feet was wonderful.

Since not many new energy drinks have been released since my last trip to the U.S., I focused on getting those with new designs, and ones I couldn't buy last time in Detroit.

Of course, I picked up the Monster Energy Assassin's Creed collaboration cans and the Rockstar Destiny 2 collaboration cans that I was missing, but I also found several new designs, and when I spotted them, I couldn't help but exclaim "Wow!"

There may have been a few varieties released since the launch, but there weren’t as many in Detroit... I really think LA is a reliable place for these kinds of finds.

It’s really fun to slowly compare my collection with the store’s stock while searching for energy drinks at the store (●´ω｀●).

To get discounts, I placed two cans of the same brand into my basket as a set, and I would skip those that didn’t match up and buy them in another store, where I could get a discount with a new item.

This is usually how I shop. It’s not a big deal in supermarkets, but when you stay too long in a small store, you start to get suspicious looks.

Red Bull Limited Street Fighter Design Cans

This trip coincided with the release of Red Bull's limited edition cans. There were five varieties in total, and I thought they would be randomly mixed in a case, so I was optimistic until I started visiting stores. (Design cans in Japan are often like that.)

After visiting a few stores, I realized that each store had only one character, and occasionally two characters. I thought it would be quite difficult to collect all five characters. It was also revealed that each case contained 24 cans of only one character (´・ω・｀).

I looked in many different stores, and I often found Ryu, Ken, and Guile, but there were no Zangief or Chun-Li cans. Even after visiting many stores, these two characters were nowhere to be found. It seemed like I wouldn’t be able to collect them all...

So, I decided to visit Downtown, which I hadn’t planned on going to. I thought the product turnover would be the fastest around here. The newly completed Intercontinental Hotel was dazzlingly bright.

It felt promising when I entered Downtown, and at the first 7-Eleven I visited, I managed to find Zangief! But Chun-Li was still nowhere to be found. By the way, after this, I only saw Zangief at this particular store. Since the release was so recent, I suspected it wouldn’t be easy to collect all the cans, but I didn’t expect it to be this hard (´；ω；｀).

As night fell, I started to get tired, but since I had come this far, I thought, "Why not check out Skid Row too?" When I got there, I was thrilled to finally find Chun-Li!! ( ´∀｀)b????

By the way, this store was the one where I found the Summer Edition that was nowhere to be found in 2014! It was a miracle, and I was so moved. I didn’t expect I would be coming back to this store again (laughs).

After this, I visited many other stores in different areas, but Chun-Li was only available at this particular one. This is what makes being an energy drink traveler so fun ((o(´∀｀)o)).

If I had more time, it wouldn’t have been so difficult to collect all the characters, but I think the joy of completing the collection is even greater when it's a bit of a challenge.

No Espresso Monster

By the time I got Chun-Li, I still hadn’t encountered the new Espresso Monster from Monster Energy. It felt similar to the situation in LA this May when Hydro was nowhere to be found... I thought it was strange since it was being distributed in other states.

I suspected it hadn’t made it to the LA area yet, so I moved my search to Long Beach. There were quite a few stores, including several 7-Elevens, so I checked them all, but none had it (Σ(´∀｀；)).

The main areas I searched this time are shown below.

The red areas indicate the main areas I visited this time. I moved around quite a bit.

I searched all stores in the LA area that are known for carrying newer releases of products, but unfortunately, it was a bust (ヽ´ω`).

After visiting all these places, I began to feel more confident in my hypothesis that "it hasn't been released in LA yet." Despite not getting it, I strangely felt satisfied (*´ｪ`*).

Rockstar Pure Zero 1st Release Can, Mandarin Orange Found

While I was looking for the Red Bull limited edition cans and Espresso Monster, I was lucky enough to find the Rockstar Pure Zero Mandarin Orange 1st release can! v(´∀｀*v)
With the extensive range of places I had visited, the chances of stumbling upon rare items like this increased.

I knew that the Blacktop Mandarin Orange was available in LA, but I didn’t expect to find the first release of Mandarin Orange. It was also a Blacktop, but the flavors "Orange" and "Mandarin" were swapped compared to the usual version.
*Actually, this was a mistake. I explain this in my 2018 Los Angeles hunt, so please read that as well. Sorry for the confusion m(_ _)m.

It Became a Kind of LA Recap Trip

I originally thought this trip would be a relaxed and leisurely one, but the hunt turned out to be far more difficult than expected, and it became a trip to various areas. There were still many unsold items left, which made it interesting (*´艸｀*).

Downtown, South Central, Inglewood, Torrance, and the beach areas... Visiting places I had been to before gave me a nostalgic feeling, and I think it would be amazing to visit regularly. Especially since the flight time from Tokyo to LA has become more convenient, I highly recommend it ( ´∀｀)b????.

My energy drink journey in 2017 concluded with this LA trip. It was an extraordinary year with 10 overseas expeditions! I don’t think I’ll be able to go this many times again (and can’t afford to! ????), but I hope to continue sharing local information from these energy drink travels (●´ω｀●).