Caffeinated Investing

A cup of coffee hasn't been good enough for most people for quite some time now. Even a couple cups are quickly becoming too little for America's morning energy needs, as the continued rise of energy drinks prove.  Drinks like Red Bull and 5-hour Energy are being sold seemingly everywhere and eating up a huge share of the beverage market. But with Red Bull GmbH and Living Essentials (Red Bull's and 5-hour Energy's companies, respectively) being privately owned, how can investors find a way to gain from the energy drink craze?

As of now, there are four serious contenders on Wall St. looking to gain a dominating presence within this market. No drink market would get this successful without the two major beverage giants PepsiCo. (PEP) and The Coca-Cola Company (KO) trying to stake their claim, while Starbucks Corporation (SBUX) has it's own brand of energy drinks that aims to be as trendy as their coffees, and lastly, there is Monster (MNST), the smaller company with a head start on everyone else. Right now Pepsi is making huge effort to make their Mountain Dew-related drink Kickstarter to succeed during March Madness, which would pay off with the foothold that it's rival Coca-Cola has been trying to get.

While the drink companies have been around for a long time it is the Energy Drink that is bringing new life to many of these companies.