Rekt Is Reaching the Masses

Rektguy didn’t mint out its free NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain in 2022—but three years later, the brand has become incredibly familiar with the phrase “sold out,” with the Rekt Drinks brand clearing out successive drops and reaching more and more consumers along the way.

The brand, which weathered a brutal crypto bear market thanks in part to the strength of its fervent community, has now sold more than 600,000 cans of Rekt Drinks, a non-alcoholic, flavored sparkling water that comes in a variety of different flavors. And this week, the brand earned placement at 7-Eleven, starting with a trio of stores in Southern California. 

Rekt Brands co-founder Ovie Faruq (aka OSF) told Decrypt that it’s “kind of funny” that the original Rektguy NFT offering didn’t mint out. The project, which started as an art collection and a “side quest” for Faruq, has since morphed its way into a leading Web3 brand, with beverages helping it expand beyond the blockchain.

(Disclosure: Ovie Faruq’s Canary Labs is an investor in DASTAN, the parent company of Rug Radio and Decrypt.)

“We sort of had a decision to make. We didn’t really promise anything, there was no roadmap, no promises made—it was really just meant to be an art collection,” he said of Rektguy. “But over the next two years, we seemed to just have this really super sticky, tight-knit community that stuck around.” 

It was during the summer of 2023 when ideas started to blossom about potential expansions.

“We spoke a while about Rektguy versus Rekt as a concept. We had put the logo on a few things, and it sort of felt like this Rekt thing could be a brand,” Faruq said, adding that the goal became getting the logo in as many places as possible. 

Drinks felt like a natural connection, according to Faruq, thanks in part to the ability to manufacture them cheaply—plus the connection to Rektguy’s imagery, which features a hooded skeleton holding a drinking bottle.

With no experience in drinks, the team brought on an advisor who had started a drinks company in the UK. Through trial and error, they got cans of Rekt into the hands of attendees at NFT Paris in 2024—and they liked it. 

“The feedback was really good. It was surprisingly good,” said Faruq. “Considering we had no experience in drinks, we just kind of like made up this drink to fuck around and find out, so to speak. It was really, really good feedback.” 

From there, the team decided to try to manufacture a bigger batch and sell them, leading to its first major sale of Liquidated Lime drinks last October—a collection of 222,000 drinks that it sold out in 48 hours.

Prior to the sale, Rekt built out a rewards program to incentivize users to engage with the brand, rewarding Drank Points to those who participated in social quests and drink purchasers as well. By earning points, users were later eligible to claim Rekt Coin (REKT), an Ethereum-based token tied to the brand. 

“I was really inspired by the Solana phone,” said Faruq about the Solana Saga, an Android smartphone that initially faced weak demand, but then sold out once the Bonk meme coin offered to buyers surged in value. “No one touched it, tons of supply left—but as soon as people could claim a $500 BONK airdrop, the phone sold out in like 24 hours.” 

After its initial success, the brand teamed up with Ethereum layer-2 network Abstract for a drop of Abstract Apple, a new flavor of its sparkling water, selling out even faster than before.

“After that, we just had tons of people reaching out to us for collaborations,” said Faruq, whose brand also dropped drinks via collabs with NFT marketplace OpenSea and Solana decentralized exchange aggregator, Jupiter. 

But beyond the crypto walls, the connections didn’t always come easily.

“No one’s really heard of us outside of crypto. We did the first sale, and people are sort of wondering if this is a one-hit wonder sort of thing,” he said, adding that the brand’s crypto origins initially led to some skepticism, as well. “You tell people the story, they expressed some interest, but there wasn’t really a ton of movement,” he added.

But after the Abstract and OpenSea drops, the brand started to pick up some momentum that has carried into its placements in 7-Eleven stores, placing Rekt alongside giants of the beverage industry.

“With 7-Eleven, I just think we had a very strong pitch to them,” said Faruq. “This is the perfect product for a 7-Eleven store, and we can get a ton of people out to the stores when we launch it and make it some really big thing and a really good launch. They were onboard.” 

The brand carried out its first 7-Eleven activation on Thursday, overselling its initial planned supply of 600 cans in the process. The cans were priced at $2.80 a pop, or $10 for a 4-pack. Another event took place Friday, with the last set for Saturday. And early 4-pack buyers each day will earn an allotment of REKT tokens, as well.

“​​[You] never really know if people will turn up to stuff when it’s not a crypto event,” Faruq told Decrypt of the initial Thursday event. “But we had a good turnout, and all the drinks selling out was obviously nice.”

Edited by Andrew Hayward