1/x Okay, grab a c̷u̷p̷ ̷o̷f̷ ̷c̷o̷f̷f̷e̷e can of water. Today I will tell you about one of the coolest and most innovative brands that you've never heard of. This is...
Liquid Death - a company selling canned water.
2/x Before Mike Cessario founded Liquid Death in 2017, he worked as a Creative Director over at Netflix on shows like House of Cards, Narcos and Stranger Things.
And before that, he played in metal and hardcore/punk bands, which obviously influenced some choices later on...
3/x There's an ideology called Straight Edge that sprung from hardcore/punk in the 70's, which basically means that you rebel against the mainstream through self-control. No alcohol, no drugs & so on. Veganism/vegetarism is now common in these circles as well.
4/x That is basically where the idea came from to make water cool again. Also, the "usual metal fan" of course loves horror themed artwork and would therefore join the cult immediately too, straight edge or not. I mean, why wouldn't they?
5/x That is probably why Live Nation invested in the company's $23M Series B round last year (on a $82M pre-money valuation), and started offering only Liquid Death on every event for a period of time afterwards.
6/x The two horror inspired main taglines "Murder Your Thirst" & "Death To Plastic" are all over their cans, banners, merch (yes, a water company can sell merch too!) and whatever else.
Even the "contact us" on their website has an eerie feel to it, it's called "summon us".
7/x Although, the aggressive metal/punk image is not something they take very serious. If you read their "about" page (pasted in Word for highlights), you immediately see that they are doing it just for effect; for fun.
They even call their own approach "completely unnecessary".
8/x And except the gruesome gory graphics and rough metal inspired taglines, they are doing all kinds of crazy stuff that no beverage company has ever done before, least of all a company selling "mountain water".
The merch shop is just amazing:
9/x The most awesome item of all is probably the life-sized Executioner, priced at $64.
10/x Or how about this zombie protection device called "The No-Brainer", which was released together with Netflix as a promo thing for the "Army of the Dead" movie release. It cools your head so zombies can't feel the warmth of your brain....
11/x And speaking of movies, they are actually producing a full-length horror movie called "Dead Till Death" as well, and I have a feeling it will revolve around water.. thirst.. and plastic.
12/x They are also masters of using consumer feedback to their advantage, both good and bad (especially bad.. more on that in the next tweet). I think this is genius.
13/x As if the movie productions wasn't enough, they have now released two full-length albums written solely with negative reviews as lyrics, called Greatest Hates - with musicians from Rise Against, Anti-Flag, Alkaline Trio & so on.
My fav: "Dumbest Name Ever For Water".
14/x And of course, they are available on colored vinyl. Why the hell wouldn't they be?
15/x They also have some sort of exclusive club which I think involves unlimited Liquid Death deliveries to your fridge, Country Club merch and events/concerts. A life-long membership costs $125,000 and can be bought in the shop.
16/x Another way of getting unlimited cans is by using their Killer Baby Namer (name generator). If you actually name your kid something like "Megalodong Murderbones Johnson" and can prove it, the subscription is allegedly yours forever.
17/x They have also created this weird "fake" anti plastic organization called Keep The Underworld Beautiful website with lots of weird video clips, which just redirects you to the LD online shop if you want to donate. keeptheunderworldbeautiful.org
18/x And the reason I wrote fake in quotation marks is that they are actually giving away money to *real* anti plastic charities. For every sold can, 5 cent goes to these two organizations:
19/x Oh, I almost forgot.. One of the most bizarre items in the shop is their plush toys of plastic tortured animals called Cutie Polluties. This trio costs $75.
20/x Liquid Death wants to challenge the plastic bottle water status quo, and they do it purposefully. By drinking LD, you can be healthy, be cool, feel like being in a cult AND help save the planet. I love it.
"Take a simple idea and take it seriously." as Charlie Munger said..
21/x So, whenever you want to sponsor an anonymous Swedish guy writing about finance and entrepreneurship on Twitter, let me know @Cessario! It's really impressive what you are doing.
Btw, @rorysutherland - do you know about Liquid Death? I'd love to hear what you think!
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