Red Bull gives you wings; new drink brings you down

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Lino Fleury has created what is dubbed the "anti-energy" drink.

Slow Cow is packaged like the popular Red Bull energy drink, but it has the opposite effect. "It's a balm that soothes people and takes the edge off stress," says Fleury.

The entrepreneur got the idea of creating a relaxing drink while driving to La Tuque, a city 250 kilometres north of Quebec City.

"I came to think that there is no beverage to help people slow down when they are stressed. Energy drinks are full of caffeine and they tend to increase anxiety, not reduce it," he notes.

The sales of energy drinks reached 35 million litres in Canada in 2006 and Fleury knows he is chipping away at a huge market. The launch of Slow Cow didn't go unnoticed and Red Bull sent the Quebec startup a formal notice to close, claiming the packaging of Slow Cow copies that of Red Bull.

Fleury doesn't deny his design showing two cows relaxing is an allusion to the popular energy drink represented by two bulls fighting. But he says his lawyers are confident they will win this case.

It took him and his team a year and a half to come up with Slow Cow. The drink is made of mostly natural ingredients that are meant to calm without making the consumer drowsy, such as camomile, passion flower and valerian.

The key ingredient is L-Theanine, an amino acid found in tea plants said to induce a relaxed yet focused state of mind. This is not a new discovery, but scientists are starting to learn more about it.

"I think this is the best-kept secret in natural medicine," says Dr. Michael Lyon, who heads the Canadian Centre for Functional Medicine, a research group in Vancouver.

Lyon conducted the first clinical trial of L-Theanine for Health Canada and said some 60 studies on the ingredient have been done, including many in recent years. "It has a very interesting sort of paradoxical effect; it calms down but without sedating. It also increases concentration and mental awareness," says Lyon, who regularly takes L-Theanine to cope with stress.

Unlike many natural substances, L-Theanine goes straight from the blood into the brain and soothing effects are felt within 30 minutes, Lyon notes.

The natural ingredient is approved and listed in the Canadian Natural Health Products Directorate.

Since Slow Cow was launched last December, Fleury said it has become a success. It is appealing equally to sports enthusiasts, professionals and students looking to stay alert without staying up at night, he notes.

The drink is currently sold in Quebec, but the company is in talks to sell the product in France, United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, the United States, Russia, Italy, China and in the rest of the country.

"It's just a question of time before we're able to sell it all over the world," Fleury says.

The drink is produced by the Montreal company AromAtik.

-- Canwest News Service

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 6, 2009 A2