Review: Raspberry Lemon

The Raspberry Lemon flavor of Novo organic sports drink is, like the other flavors, made with 35 percent juice. This particular variety contains coconut water, white grape juice (the drink’s sweetener), raspberry juice, and lemon juice. They’ve added sea salt, which gives the drink a noticeably salty note, but otherwise the drink tastes very much like a fruit punch flavor. You can definitely taste the white grape in this variety more than in other flavors, which is something that we’d like less of. Otherwise, it delivers as promised, with notes of raspberry and lemon at the finish. Ultimately, the flavor is good, but it doesn’t taste like a sports drink aside from the salty note. Visually, the product uses a stock 16.9 oz. bottle and a label wrapped around the middle. It’s a clean design that eschews the technical and performance themes that you find on most sports drinks. Instead, they are playing up the organic aspect of the drink by using simple illustrated graphics while steering clear of words like hydration. While we appreciate this approach, it seems like it could use a little more follow-through. Specifically, there seems to be a disconnect between the name, which has no explanation of its meaning, and the visual design. That said, it’s hard to say who this drink will ultimately appeal to or what its strongest demographic will be. Overall, it’s a good start and we hope that Novo can refine it and take it further.