Two Indiana University students are using science, business-driven, and a love for cycling to build a new kind of drink… one they say helps you “hydrate while you celebrate.”
Luke Naas, a 2025 graduate of IU’s Kelley School of Business, and Lucas Lemme, a neuroscience major and senior, co-founded 9AM Club in August 2024. What began as a conversation between two Little 500 teammates has grown into a brand appearing on shelves across Bloomington.
“We wanted to find a way to go out, have fun, and still wake up ready to chase our goals,” Lemme said.
Both members of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, first experimented with combining electrolytes used for bike training with vodka and fruit juice. They noticed that after drinking it, they felt less drained than usual the next morning.
What began as a passing “what if” quickly turned into an idea worth pursuing. From there, they started digging into the research.
Then came 9AM Club, a vodka-based cocktail infused with agave nectar, electrolytes, and natural fruit juice. The drink contains 8% alcohol by volume, is gluten-free, and has no carbonation or added sugar.
Lemme’s background in neuroscience inspired him to research how electrolytes and fruit sugars could aid hydration.
“I started reading studies on hydration and recovery,” he said. “We knew we couldn’t make something that cured hangovers, but we wanted people to feel better than they normally would the next day.”
Although the founders can’t claim the drink “prevents hangovers” under federal law, they say it’s designed to target dehydration– one of the biggest causes of hangover symptoms.
According to Zachary Schlader, a professor in IU’s School of Public Health, there is some science to that logic, but it’s not a full fix.
“If you take electrolytes in, the fluid stays in your body longer,” Schlader said. “Straight water passes through the kidneys more quickly. But electrolytes don’t stop alcohol from dehydrating you.”
Creating a product that could be sold legally and at scale took months of research, networking, and university guidance.
Naas first pitched the idea to Dennis Spahr, a marketing professor at the Kelley School of Business, who helped connect the pair to IU Innovates — a program that supports student entrepreneurs.
Through Innovates, they met mentors like Parker Busick and Julie Heath, who introduced them to Cardinal Spirits, a Bloomington distillery that now produces 9AM Club commercially.