Breaking Stereotypes and College Debts — Black Student Athlete Raises over $20,000 for Sports Drink Success

— Lamar Letts, a student at Northeastern University, say his new product Hylux, which is a vitamin enhanced water, is the best alternative to traditional sports drinks —

Boston, MA — Northeastern University’s 4th year student, Lamar Letts, has formulated a sports drink called Hylux that offers the best alternative to traditional sports drinks: a vitamin enhanced water that is low calorie, low sugar, and high nutrient drink. Hylux recently launched a Kickstarter project and in a short time, Letts has managed to raise more than $13,000. Before this, Letts was awarded a $10,000 grant from IDEA, Northeastern University’s venture accelerator.

The drink has received positive reviews. Jack Choros of The Huffington Post remarked, “Letts has visions of taking on giants like Gatorade, Powerade and Vitamin Water with his own brand. The drink itself is pretty fantastic. It tastes just as good as the others but boasts a few distinct advantages over the competition.” Another review by Jae Monique read, “There is some hype surrounding the new vitamin enhanced water and next generation sport drink, Hylux.”

Apart from making his drink a success among athletes, Lamar Letts also has more objectives to fulfill with this drink. He plans to use 3% of the proceeds from the sale of Hylux to provide clean water in underdeveloped countries. The donations will be primarily made to waters.org, a nonprofit working to provide clean water and sanitation to such regions.

Lamar Letts was a former athlete, but due to an unexpected heart injury, he had to give up his career as a track athlete. Being advised by his doctor to take good care of his diet, Lamar had to start diluting his sports drinks with water to reduce the sugar and calorie content. This is where the idea of having a low sugar and low calorie sports drink came from, and Lamar Letts created Hylux in his freshman year of college.
Hylux hit the market in 2014 and is distributed in gyms and health clubs in New York and Boston. Hylux contains 4 different electrolytes, B complex vitamins, more potassium than a banana, 10 grams of sugar and 40 calories per serving. Hylux meets all of Whole Food’s ingredient guidelines and has no preservatives or artificial ingredients.

More information about Hylux can be found on its Kickstarter page at www.kickstarter.com/projects/1732104715/hylux-water-student-athlete-creates-next-gen-sport or the Hylux website located at www.drinkhylux.com