Logan Paul and KSI's energy drink Prime has taken the world by storm since its release, with fans going to desperate measures to get hold of the viral beverage from stores across the UK, Birmingham Live reports. Fans frantically trying to buy the drink has caused mass queues in Aldi and more recently Costco, with demand so high that bottles are being sold for double, if not triple, the price online.
To help customers, developer Tom Bastable set up an app called Prime Tracker UK, which tracks the stock of the drink in supermarkets and corner stores across the country. Using the app Prime fans can inform other users when and where stock becomes available, or unavailable, at various stores.
To assess if the app actually worked, Birmingham Live reporter Jacob Davies gave it a try as he attempted to track down the elusive energy drink.
The app costs 89p on the Apple App Store, which seems reasonable given the sky-high demand for the drink. Jacob said the price was a small one to pay, "until you realise you're paying to join a never ending game of cat and mouse, which will leave you chasing the drink endlessly and wasting hours of your time.
"The frustrating thing is this app should work as a concept. A sea of red dots indicate all stores which sell the drink, and they turn green if that store has stock available. This is adjusted whenever a customer sends a picture of their drink purchase at any given supermarket and the developers verify it.
"The problem is that this is a slow process, with user reviews reporting that people send in photos only for them to take hours to become 'verified'. As a result, the app falls behind and stock tracking becomes untrustworthy."
Jacob adds that the product turns up so sporadically in random locations that users only have a limited amount of time to frantically rush to a random Asda that could have already had their shelves emptied by the time the user gets there.
Jacob says: "I attempted to use the tracking app for two days. The first day I never even made it to any store, as the app would flip back to out of stock whilst I was in my car en-route. After three attempts I gave up and decided to try again the next day."
However day two turned out to be worst of the endeavour, with Jacob attempting to reach four different stores across Birmingham, with driving time varying between 15 and 30 minutes from the city centre, only to find each store was out of Prime by the time he got there.
Jacob says: "The most infuriating was my final attempt, when all of Birmingham was a sea of red dots and I decided to attempt journeying 40 minutes to Redditch, the nearest in-stock store.
"I refreshed the app throughout my journey and Prime remained available right up until I pulled into a car parking spot - and then it updated to sold out. So close, and yet so agonisingly far."
The experience left Jacob fed up and tired, questioning if using the app was even worth it for the biggest fans of Logan Paul or KSI: "Admittedly I don't really understand the obsession anyway, so maybe if you're a KSI or Logan Paul fan you'll happily waste hours of your life and gallons of petrol patrolling Birmingham until you chance upon the holy grail. But anyone else who still has their sanity should avoid using this app.
"User reviews have even reported that the red dot stores (the majority all Birmingham supermarkets) are more likely to have stock than those that the app recommends, so clearly there is no law or logic to this strange game.
"If you do venture out to discover the mythical Prime drink, you're better off picking a store out of a hat and chancing it than trying to track it on this frustrating and pointless app. Save yourself the pain and settle for a good old fashioned Red Bull instead."
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