The success of the brand couldn’t overcome the claims and actions others saw as out of bounds, and ultimately juries and judges.
In 2018 Monster sued Owoc and his company and thought it took time, won. In September 2022 the culmination of years of lawsuits – on both sides – of things like false advertising ended with Owoc losing and having judgments totaling hundreds of millions.
“Energy drink maker Monster Energy Co. was awarded $293 million in damages by a California federal jury in a false advertising and trade secrets case against the maker of Bang Energy and its CEO Jack Owoc over the drink’s “super creatine” branding—with the potential for more to come.
The jury awarded $272 million for the false advertising claim, $18 million for tortious interference, and $3 million for the trade secret claim, according to Monster’s co-lead trial counsel Moez Kaba of Hueston Hennigan LLP.
The verdict said that VPX and Owoc’s actions were willful, and Judge Jesus Bernal will decide if they face enhanced and punitive damages, Kaba said.
VPX has been on the losing side of a number of legal disputes across the country. In July, Monster won $175 million and 5% of VPX’s sales of Bang products in a trademark dispute.
VPX has also been hit with lawsuits from the three largest record labels for allegedly using unlicensed music in promotional videos posted to the social network TikTok. In two of those cases, judges ruled that VPX was liable for copyright infringement.” Bloomberg
Now look, there were twists and turns in these lawsuits. Owoc actually won some, however as it stands the losses are in his side. And he’s lost what he created.
Just yesterday Owoc was made to take down social media posts against his former company by a judge. He still has the Instagram account @Bangenergy.ceo with over a million followers and was posting angry frustrations about the company he no longer runs. He was told he’d be fined $25,000 a day until he took them down. He deleted the comments but did so in his typical style, including commenting on why he won’t give over passwords.
“He said he has closely guarded his social media accounts because of how important and valuable they are to his personal brand, which he described as the “the Jack Owoc persona.” Bloomberg
While it’s not clear what Owoc will do in the future, with the company or otherwise. The Instagram handle he still controls shows a connection he doesn’t want to give up, his care for his life’s work that he built is clear. Five days ago he posted Bang ads just like he did before his ousting. He is still rooting for its success even if he hasn’t accepted his new seat in the audience.
What remains though is a beverage industry still controlled by a few behemoths. Their market share is controlled partly through lawyers funded with deep pockets they fight off competition. As clearly no other companies have been able to challenge leaders, and recently Bang has lost a few percentage points in market share, dominance continues.
An industry with that much power in a few hands is an issue. Why and how it continues is with closer examining. Someone with as much self-love and bravado as Owoc has succeeded in showing an important lesson; one can be right and still be wrong.
Something tells me we will hear more from this man. Though I’m sure many of us will be skipping the shockumentary.
