Gotta love when corporations “investigate themselves” and find “no wrong doing”

The craziest part of all of this to me is the fact that MatPat on Food Theory, like a year ago when it first came out, made a whole video based on the fact that this drink could kill someone

Even if I saw a "These are highly caffeinated!" sign I STILL would not have thought that they had THAT MUCH in them! That is three Redbulls per Charged Lemonade!

I worked at a Panera and when these lemons were released and they always had the caffeine amount for 20 & 30 oz printed on the same label that tells you the flavor. Working there i realized a solid 80% of customers do not read any of the labels, unless that label was somebody else's food order. The lemonade were left in a spot with free access to it and cups. This lead to lots of theft of this product. I stopped or tried to stop many parents from allowing their kids to drink it. Most of them listened and thanked me. The ones that didn't listen just seemed to ignore me. I felt like the product was grossly mishandled and should have always been behind the counter to control access to it.

One thing I don't think Charlie touched on is that these drinks have MORE caffeine than actual energy drinks. That's insane.

One of the biggest issues with the charged lemonade is that its placed EXACTLY where the old lemonade was, not just next to the uncaffeinated drinks

this is incredibly sad because these 2 deaths could have absolutely been prevented. people were talking about this long before the deaths occurred and panera did nothing.

When i worked at starbucks I was damned sure to tell parents that the cool lime refresher had more caffeine that the java chip frap. Most parents didn't know and got their kids a lemonade in stead.

As someone who used to work at Panera, the first thing all my coworkers and I said when they launched these was that someone was going to die. They put them in the place where all the old non-caffeinated lemonades were, and had no indication of any kind of caffeine on the labels. Anytime someone would order one I would warn them of the caffeine content. Most people were shocked when I told them. The fact that they have a drink that’s refillable with more caffeine than an energy drink is insanity to me.

The worst part of all of this is the fact that Panera has a sip club membership in which the customer can get a free LARGE charged lemonade every 2 hours from open to close - a Panera employee

MatPat even made a theory video on this and even said it could kill people, crazy and sad that it still happened

This is actually sad, seeing that this was covered by MatPat a while back. He went through everything that could happen if someone were to drink too much of it, and here is one of those possibilities being covered. :')

Matpat made a food theory about this potentially being deadly and now it’s become a reality.

As someone who worked as a cashier at Panera, I had to warn parents multiple times that the lemonade they were getting for their kids had caffeine in it. 9 times out of 10 they were horrified because they didn't realize what "charged" meant. Also, everyone who worked there was super loosey goosey about the ratio of charged liquid to lemonade. So how much of a caffeine punch you got changed with whoever was making it.

I remember Mat pat covered this over on food theory years ago. He basically implied that it was only a matter of time before someone died. Edit: I have lost track of time, so it was only about a year ago not “years”

I had no idea what this product was until I saw this video, then I remembered I saw a video about it about a year or so ago. This girl who would go into Panera to work on her laptop said she would drink it not knowing how caffinated it was, but it kept her energized and helped her stay productive. But she eventually started realizing it was making her heart race, and she said that every time she drank it, it made her feel like The Hulk. So she looked up how much caffeine was in it and also agreed that it could've potentially sent her to the hospital had she not become aware of it.

How incredibly sad is to lose your father or husband just because he was happily trying to drink just a lemonade. This case gave me one of these strong moments of realization and empathy after so much desensitization.

I've been an employee there for 4 years now and my biggest issue at this moment is how the employees are being trained to handle this drink. We have one manager at our cafe who got the portioning ratio wrong for the lemonades which made it even MORE concentrated. He went on to incorrectly train 3 more employees this and nobody caught on for like 3 weeks. Any beverage that has to be hand-prepared should never be even close to a lethal dose, because human error happens way too often, especially for employees who get paid $10.

I really hope this lawsuit leads to clearer descriptions on "energy" or extremely caffeinated products! I'm pretty sensitive to caffeine and hate energy drinks, and I can't count the amount of times I thought I was just buying a can of cold brew coffee when really it was coffee + energy drink.

Caffeine overdose is no joke- i accidentally did it with chocolate with caffeine in it. It scared the shit out of me when I was having an attack. To not know how much caffeine you’re in taking and suddenly start having extreme symptoms is extremely scary. I feel bad for the families and victims where by this

As a former employee, I’m unfortunately not surprised this has happened. Panera is a shady and misleading corporation. The food isn’t healthy, a majority of it isn’t fresh, and it’s insanely overpriced for the amount of food you’re getting. Hopefully, some kind of justice is served for these victims and their families.

its crazy how Food Theory broke down the dangerous levels of caffeination in Charged Lemonade months ago and Panera just continued with their practices

That lemonade was to "die" for

Simply having an unlimited drinks thing with effectively an energy drink (even worse than coffee where you kinda have to take your time and let it cool down, plus less caffeine content per drink) sounds like its begging to go wrong. Consider an open bar, but you don't throw up or black out, your heart just explodes.

Sarah was my cousin, and she was one of the smartest, most kind people I knew. She was very aware of her heart condition, and avoided caffeine. Seeing people blame Sarah is both disgusting and disheartening, and I am baffled that people aren't holding Panera more accountable.

as a panera worker, the amount of people getting these in LARGES is scary. I also fell into the group of "not knowing it was caffeinated" when i started working there, since I thought it was just pink lemonade. I was jittering for the next couple hours

Like my lawyer always says: one death is a coincidence, two are a firing of a scapegoat employee

I used to work at a Panera and remember when that stuff came out, we experimented with the syrup in like other drinks and stuff but yeah it's like super potent and Panera does a horrible job showing people how strong it is, even some of the cashiers would personally warn customers. I remember a lot of elderly people ordering it without knowing

I remember when the 21-year old passed. I read an article about it on a news-themed instagram account. I paid the comments a visit and I could not believe the amount of people saying “She should have known” was absolutely baffling. The ignorance of people who do not have to worry about every thing they are consuming is beyond me.

The real issue isn't panera. It's the legal loophole that panera and others have used to advertise caffeine drinks as not energy drinks under the FDA. Besides sueing panera, people should be going after the FDA.

The biggest issue is that someone who isn’t used to high caffeine intake or drinking energy drinks, can die from it and there’s no warning label in any way. As someone who used to drink charged lemonades every day for about a year and a half, it wasn’t that bad to me. The only reason why I stopped is because I wanted to reduce my caffeine intake.

This is really scary because I'm someone who has some sort of caffeine intolerance that causes panic attacks. I can handle a mug of tea every few days but even a single mug of coffee ruins my day (stomach aches, panic attacks, and insomnia). If I accidently drank that lemonade, I genuinely don't know what would happen. My caffeine issues isn't tested by doctors so I don't know if its a serious issue or not.

MatPat did a video on this exact drink, he said it was insanely easy to misconstrue as regular Lemonade (being located in the “normal drinks/tea” section and minimal signage on its caffeine levels) and even hypothesized that was all on purpose. You’d drink the lemonade, get that unexpected boost of energy, feel good about it and attribute that feeling to the Lemonade, and all of a sudden you’re hooked. He showed a video of some girl who was legit addicted to them, having multiple a day. Honestly, I haven’t thought of Panera and those drinks since watching his video, but it didn’t surprise me at all to hear people have died from it sadly. It just seemed almost inevitable after watching MatPat’s video, and I think he even came to the conclusion someone might die or at least be hospitalized from it at some point. Hell, I wanted one before because I love lemonade, but happened to see MatPat’s video first lol I don’t drink much caffeine at all, so that would’ve blasted me into another dimension

I almost got the charged lemonade, and i wanna say a massive thank you to the employee that asked if i was aware of the caffeine content. I have a few underlying issues, and cannot have caffeine. I dont even drink decaf coffee or tea, because i dont wanna take a chance of a mix up, and some brands still have caffeine. Long story short, im very vigilant about this kind of thing.I went to Panera for the first time in years, and I always get a lemonade. I dont recall seeing anything about it being an energy drink on the drive through menu, it couldve been there, but the menu has so many drinks and the writing is so small, I couldve missed something. I didnt think anything of the name "Charged", I thought it was an edgy new way to market citrus based drinks. On an average day, a can of pepsi is enough to put me in the danger zone. I was recovering from flu at the time so i was especially vulnerable. Im convinced that person saved my life. I know it sounds dramatic, but that amount of caffeine would no doubt, absolutely have put me in the hospital. I wish I had the receipt so i could get her name and send an email to her boss for her excellent customer service. Shes probably saved a lot of people from literal heartache.

having POT’s and knowing that would’ve killed me is crazy. i live in Australia and we don’t have panera here anyway but still insane to think about

A usual can of soda has around 35-45mg caffeine per can. Kickstarters usually have about twice this at around 80mg. Celsius and Prime have 200 per can/bottle, which is for reference, about 5 cans of soda worth of caffiene. The charged lemonade has about as much caffeine as a whole 10 cans of an average soda.

I am 22 and thinking that a 21 year old could die from just grabbing a drink with her friends is just so scary.

I worked at Panera for a while and their advertising around the charged lemonade is shady as hell. They label it as having as much caffeine as a cup of their dark roast coffee when it actually has 4-5 times that amount. It’s insane.

the pre-workout i use is ryse stim-daddy. its a pre meant to have ADDED stimulant. the serving is only 10mg caffeine more than the large lemonade..

It was heartbreaking when I heard about this, the girl went to my school and I briefly spoke to her once but she was really nice.

I remember the first time I had Panera’s “charged lemonade” I assumed it was caffeinated due to the name but not THAT caffeinated. I got so buzzed I felt sick afterwards, and I drink 2-3 cups of coffee a day usually… but this shit backhanded me into the multiverse. Not sure why Panera felt the need to caffeinate it to this extreme. I will not be having one ever again.

When I heard Charged Lemonade, I would have assumed it had as much caffeine as Starbucks refreshers or something, around a cup of coffee’s worth. Never would have expected pre-workout levels of caffeine. To me it just doesn’t make much sense to put that much caffeine in when like a quarter of the caffeine would still give most people a nice little buzz and would account for people getting a refill

You'd think they'd make employees fold a piece of paper and stand it up with "charged lemonade has caffeine" written with sharpie by now at the very least.

I had four of these one time when studying for finals and It made me feel like my soul was vibrating

MatPat straight up predicted this when he covered the Charged Lemonades on Food Theory

As someone who used to work for Panera, I can tell you this lemonade has to be incredibly addictive. We had people coming back multiple times in the store just to ask for more and would get angry if we didn’t serve them refills (since we could only give one per customer). One guy even threw his full drink at my co-worker because they didn’t serve him two. Weird as hell.

Yeah, I had to inform my mom a few months ago when she first tried it about the bat shit crazy stuff in those lemonades. She had a bad headache, and the caffeine helped a lot, so she said she should “get (it) every time (she) come(s) here.” I immediately went on the same rant Mat Pat made lmao.

I would assume anything with the name CHARGED is going to have a lot of caffeine

I have the same heart condition as the first person who died. I am told to be very careful around heavily caffeinated drinks, but could very, very easily have assumed the lemonade was safe for me. This shit is deadly and they need to lose a lot of money and get rid of it entirely. I am glad that this should hopefully bring some awareness not to the condition itself, but falsely advertising drinks with a shit ton of extra chemicals or whatever. RIP, and this is absolutely insane.

I'll never understand why these fucking companies can't just be like "We have become aware that due to an oversight in the marketing of our new "Charged Lemonade" product, there has resulted a tragic loss of life. Our hearts and sympathy are with the families of those who were victim to this error, and we will seek to compensate them as best we can within the boundary of reason. In order to prevent this from happening again in the future, we will be notifying all Panera Bread locations to label "Charged Lemonade" appropriately as a highly caffeinated beverage." It would be so much less effort than fighting a drawn out legal battle and would do nothing but make the company look good in the eyes of the reasonable. People fuck up sometimes, admit, fix it if i can be fixed, apologize and try not to do it again in the future. It's really not that hard.

That raising hand joke in the beginning was pretty funny ngl xD

I work as a manager at a panera and can say for my store at least we’ve been warning people about how caffeinated it is since day 1 of launch

The idea that they're just casually selling a glorified Red Bull fountain drink with free refills is... kind of eerie. Like, one visit won't just give you wings; you'll be spouting wings out of every orifice in your body like a chaos spawn.

I've worked at a panera for some years and the moment we got the new lemonades, me and managers knew immediately it was an issue and we always warned our customers, especially ones with kids. I told them that my pre-workouts max dosage was not close to 400ml of caffeine which is pretty much your max daily dosage, and we just thought it was so crazy. Its super sad to hear about the deaths

Drinking their lemonade is almost as dangerous as being a Boeing whistleblower

Matpat did an episode on these Charge Lemonades. I'm honestly surprised there were only 2 Casualties so far.

I'm a former panera team lead, just quit last month. Quality control is also horrendous between store to store. My managers sold the pure non diluted charged lemonade for a month or so because they didn't know they were supposed to dilute it. Whenever I had to work cash, I always warned customers how much caffeine was in those drinks and they always changed their minds. Even us night shifters would dilute it even further for a good kick before a long closing shift, it was just so strong. A common criticism I've seen of the people who have died is that they should have paid closer attention to the labels, because there WERE labels, but they were SO tiny. They were basically fine print, and as a retail worker, I can bet all my money on the fact that the average american consumer does not read labels, let alone fine print, which is something corporate should have known and expected if they have any grasp of the demographic theyre marketing to.

What honestly shocks me is that matpat made a video about this a while back and no one seemed to pay attention. My heart goes out to the families that lost their loved ones

I remember when these first came out and I went to Panera and drank 2 larges bc I thought it was normal lemonade. I’ve never been more cracked out in my life. I could feel my heartbeat in my fingertips and I could barely breathe, and I drink caffeine on a regular basis.

So grimace shakes kill 99999 people and everyone is happy, a lemonade kills 2 and everyone is upset

You also have to consider that most people already routinely have coffee or an energy drink in the morning, so Imagine unknowingly adding 390mg of caffeine to what you've already consumed just because you wanted a fruity lemonade with your lunch.

The charged lemonade has 390mg of caffeine while the FDA says that the average, non-health adverse adult should only have 400mg per day before they begin to have side effects from caffeine intake. Its insane to me that they didnt label them and crazier is that these lawsuits dont include the judge just saying "wtf, pay up and fix that shit"

Matpat called it

I hadn't heard about the second death. That's really tragic, and I'm sad to hear it

Fun fact: I now cannot have any energy drinks bc of the charged lemonade. I had one, and the cartilage in my chest inflamed near my heart to the point where I had stroke-like symptoms. I felt like my right arm was giving out and my face went numb.

I had two cups of it one time, not knowing how much caffeine was in it, and I had my first panic attack that night. I never touched the evil lemonade again.

If you see something listed on a menu as 'charged', you should probably have some curiosity about what's in it. Don't just close your eyes and drink.

Every Panera I've ever been to has had a large sign on the drinks saying how much caffeine was in them

Dude, those caffeine mg numbers are fucking ludicrous. I am a heavy, heavy caffeinated beverage enjoyer. Over 250 mg of caffeine in a single drink would have me pretty wired. 400 plus is extreme discomfort, cold sweats, insane jitters, borderline vomit inducing.

I remember a year or two back I’d ordered Panera online and seen that these drinks were new. I saw the “charged” label on them, and assumed they were caffeinated to some degree- like a Mountain Dew or something. But just to make sure, I checked to see the caffeine content. For context- I have a very low caffeine tolerance, and anything over 100 mg will make me extremely sick so I have to be vigilant. It was at the VERY BOTTOM of the nutrition facts which I had to go searching for- and I was shocked that something with that high of caffeine content wouldn’t have it stated front and center like it does on most energy drinks. I remember telling my parents that it seemed like a health hazard and I knew someone was gonna be hospitalized because of it sooner or later. I hate that things ended up the way they did.

They definitely need to be more transparent about the caffeine content and they need to market it better but I dunno what I'd do if they got rid of them, I love them. They're the only thing that gets me through my 18 hour shift at work.

Sadly, none of these companies have to label how much caffeine is in their product.

I saw the charged lemonade when I was at Panera a few weeks ago. I only kept reading the label because I was curious what “charged” meant. You had to read all the way down in order to learn it contained caffeine and how much. I was shocked at the amount. They probably shouldn’t offer free refill on it when one contains the daily recommended intake of caffeine.

I worked at Panera for 6 years. We had to move the charged lemonades to the back because we saw people giving them to children. We are also required to tell people that it’s caffeinated and we did that as soon as it came out. It’s sad that this has happened and those cafes should be informing people about them being so caffeinated… Sad situation.

I knew this story and went to Panera yesterday and still didn’t see one notice about the charged lemonade.

I remember trying paneras charged lemonade and it was wild. It was the 2nd time I had ever gone to Panera and I got mine as a fountain drink and there it did display the caffeine in it and it was like 2x as much as the fountain sodas, I remember having to put an insane amount of water so it wouldn’t be such a strong flavor

My mom was sent to the hospital after drinking this. The caffeine content in the app is hidden under two separate drop downs. Yes, it says charged, but nobody in their right mind would assume that a single drink would contain your daily limits worth of caffeine.

This is insane. I actually used to study at Panera bread pretty often a couple of months ago. While there I would drink the lemonade because with a subscription you could get unlimited drinks. I would drink around 5 of these "charged lemonades" a day while studying. I remember I started getting really fast heart palpitations and my hands would shake uncontrollably while I was trying to study. All the while I had no idea about the caffeine content. One day it hit me that charged may imply that it had caffeine content. When I checked it turned out that each lemonade contains around 250 or so milligrams of caffeine. So I was consuming around 1000-1250 mg of caffeine each day. I really thought that I might have just been an idiot and never thought much of it until just now. Edit: I also have a minor heart condition so yeah...

I once worked on an assignment at Panera and had a charged lemonade with multiple refills like 3. I definitely felt the effects. I'm lucky to be ok.

I don’t work for Panera, but instead another chain that is best known for creating sugary drinks that people stop for at 7 in the morning. However I can see Starbucks getting into a similar situation soon when people realize one of the most popular drinks contains caffeine since most people will assume it’s just juice and give 26 oz of it to their children. Which it’s not a lot of caffeine, but most people don’t seem to realize that there even is caffeine in it. I didn’t know there was caffeine until my manager told me 3 months into me working there.

As a Panera employee when the charged lemonades first came out we did warn customers about the caffeine contents of the drink, however the executives told us to stop doing that, really sad situation I do not stand by the company whatsoever but where I live it’s the only job I have the mental capacity to work.

My wife worked in leadership at Panera. She used to bring me these all the time, and even she didn't know how insane the caffeine content was. She still has the internal email to all Panera leaders regarding the "lemonade incident".

I remember when this story broke. I feel so bad for the victims who didn’t know the caffeine levels.

I decided to try one yesterday and got the regular size. Tasted just like sweat tea, couldn’t even tell it was caffeinated by the taste. I drank it pretty slow so I didn’t really feel much different but I can see how easy it would be to not realize it’s caffeinated and drink a large or even two.

Just to put this into perspective: The charged lemonade drink at Panera Bread has 390 milligrams of caffeine One 12oz redbull contains 111 milligrams of caffeine so in 1 charged lemonade your getting the same amount of caffeine from almost 3 and a half 12oz redbull cans. The amount the FDA recommends you consume per day is 400 milligrams of caffeine as a healthy adult.

As an employee of Panera, I can say I survived drinking 7 large charged lemonades over a long night. This is before I heard anyone died but wow did I feel like my heart was going to explode

As someone who loves lemonade and doesn't consume caffeine, this shit is scary.

Love how this man always just speaks his mind and his mind is never on some crazy shit, just agreeable logic dressed up all fancy with his bombastic lingo

When I got this at Panera, the employee warned me it had caffeine. There were signs on the window describing the content per size, and the signs above the literal lemonade made it very clear it was caffeinated. I noticed this at 2 different locations in louisville, and man was that shit caffeinated. If any of those steps were bypassed, yikes. Because it was tasty, and way easier to down than coffee or a carbonated energy drink

As someone who used to work for Panera Bread I can confirm that the amount of sugar for the lemonade is ludicrously high and that they didn’t do much to try to lower it

Every Panera I have been at in the last year has significant signage about the caffeine content. Inside and outside and even on the drive through window large signs. But I see how someone could get easily confused.

As someone who used to frequent Panera for these drinks when they had the free sips club for three months, they have the drinks labeled with the amount of caffeine on it and it is very noticeable and different than the regular lemonade. I don’t understand how people keep mistaking this for regular lemonade.

I studied negligence over this past semester in law school and I would love to see this case win because to me, all the elements of negligence (duty, breach of duty, causation - actual cause and proximate cause, and damages) are all pretty clearly met here in my mind. I feel so bad for these two victims. May they receive the justice they deserve.

As someone who WORKED at Panera, when the charged lemonades came out I wasn't even aware they had caffeine. I had one for the first time, only to realize I was bouncing off the walls. They do a terrible job at informing that they have caffeine.

The fact you needed to explain to us that this not being a pile of corpses should still be alarming is sad. The Internet is a wild wacky place

If you're getting taken out by caffeinated lemonade, I don't know what to tell you..

My girlfriend works at panera, and she told me before the two deaths that it had way too much caffeine and that someone is going to have a heart attack. The craziest thing is that even after the first death, all they did was add a little sign below the register, and on the machine, I swear she had to point it out for me to see it that's how small it was. I go there multiple times a week to pick her up, and one time I see two old ladies inside drinking the large size of the mango yuzu citrus or whatever at 9 in the night💀. She tells me they're supposed to tell the customers, but some of her coworkers are too lazy to tell them. They also used to leave it out with the fountain drinks so that anyone can drink some whenever they feel. Really stupid and tragic situation. Rest in peace to the victims and I wish the best for the family.

Fun story, a couple months back, I drank two servings of this without knowing they were caffeinated. It was right in the spot where the old lemonade machine was and I proceeded to gain the greatest headache and tremors I have ever felt. It subsided but I didn't think I was this close to death.

For reference, 390 mg is in the domain of highly caffeinated preworkouts that come with a laundry list of warnings

At every panera I've been to, they had the caffeine content labeled on the dispenser.