Image: Overhang claims to combat the painful after-effects of drinking. Photo: courtesy of Overhang

For some people the effects of a hangover can be severe, leaving you incapacitated for several hours with a dry mouth, pounding head and a stomach doing the conga. According to the Institute of Alcohol studies, UK businesses lose around 17 million days each year due to staff suffering from hangovers. Absenteeism coupled with lower levels of productivity from those who struggle in equates to billions of pounds lost through overindulgence.

But whether it’s wining and dining clients during the week or bingeing at the weekend, more of us are inclined to drink alcohol regularly, reinforcing a habit of working hard, playing harder and risking burn out. This all points to a gap in the market for a product that really works.

People will try almost anything in the pursuit of a genuine hangover cure, apart from abstaining. Recent crazes include visiting oxygen bars where you go to breathe pure O2, and paying hundreds of pounds for a private nurse to give you a saline drip. More modest methods such as drinking Coca-Cola or Lucozade have held their ground, but there may be a new and healthier solution. 

Compounding the problem of drinking related illness

"Hangovers consist of a number of factors."

When musician Will Wilkinson woke to a debilitating post-gig hangover, he turned to his tried and trusted family remedy for relief. Will’s Italian great-great grandfather Antonio Vacarra enjoyed an active social life so concocted his own morning-after aid to alleviate the effects of alcohol and get through the day.

Confident that the recipe not only works, but also that it hasn’t been bested since its creation, Wilkinson decided to set up a business with his father and share the 100-year-old cure. “In the morning when you're hunting for something like a coffee or an energy drink to pick you up, it's fantastic to be able to reach to the bedside table and just consume one of these and feel great again,” says Wilkinson, director of Overhang. “All the ingredients that are in there are designed to revitalise and refresh you, and pick you back up.”

Hangovers consist of a number of factors – dehydration, nausea and exhaustion – so Overhang’s 14 ingredients were chosen to tackle each individual symptom. Getting the right balance between a refreshing yet functional drink was hard, and after testing more than 50 variations on the recipe, they soon discovered that you can’t compete with tradition. “We went through so many variants of this stuff and we tried adding extra ingredients in, taking ingredients out, adding sugar, removing sugar, different levels of ginger, and ultimately, what we settled on is pretty close to the original,” Wilkinson adds.

The orange and lime juice base provides the full recommended daily amount of Vitamin C in order to quickly restore and rehydrate, ginger and raspberry leaf help settle an upset stomach, and the addition of niacin boosts the body’s metabolism to get you out of bed and feeling naturally energised.

Herbal remedies to help curb hangovers

"Overhang uniquely contains milk thistle and burdock root."

It can be hard to remember to drink several pints of water before falling into bed after drinking too much, or to get up and make yourself something when you feel dreadful the next day, but Wilkinson insists that “it doesn’t really matter” when you drink Overhang, as the ingredients work wonders at any time. So why is this cure-all any better than drinking super-hydrating, low calorie cocoanut water, or eating a bacon sandwich with pain killers?

Two key side effects of excessive drinking are liver exhaustion and stomach inflammation from a build-up of toxins. Overhang uniquely contains milk thistle and burdock root to tackle these particular problems. The liver is a powerhouse that filters harmful substances from the body; its store of enzymes metabolises alcohol, breaking it down in to acetate in a two-part process, so it can be safely removed from the body. However, drinking copious volumes means the liver’s enzymes are sure to run out, leaving much liquid in the form of acetaldehyde – a substance made in the first stage of the breakdown process and far more toxic than alcohol. This pause of metabolism causes the nausea symptoms to last much longer as you wait for your liver to restock.

Milk thistle in Overhang can reduce this downtime. The herb has been long-used as a natural way to support healthy liver function, and it encourages the organ’s ability to keep producing enzymes and flushing out toxins. Combined with milk thistle, burdock root is an age-old antioxidant believed to purify the blood, so together these plants help clean alcohol from your system, soothe your stomach, and speed up recovery time.

“The reality is that if someone has gone out on one evening and had completely overdone it, that's going to differ to someone who has woken up one morning feeling fresh, but a little bit tired,” he explains, therefore how much Overhang you need is “subjective.”

Hangover 'cures' in the market

"Overhang’s image is young and fresh."

Launched in September 2015, Overhang enjoyed an explosive first few months during the festive season, and Wilkinson excitedly confirms that Canary Wharf had “pretty much a daily delivery”, so contrary to the marketing of other products, the lead-up to the Christmas break was the perfect time to launch the drink. With a clear target demographic of students and urban professionals, Overhang’s image is young and fresh, and appeals to those needing a kickstart as much as those interested in well-being.

While the relatively high sugar content means that Overhang isn’t exactly a ‘health’ drink, it’s certainly got the right recipe to perk you up and revitalise your body. After being taken on by health food chain Holland and Barrett, the family business is now focused on growth and, with the influence of Wilkinson’s music career; you can expect to see Overhang popping up at festivals and special events in the next year.

Wilkinson says that: “The more and more feedback we get about the drink we're learning a lot more about consumers and that it's much more than that. People are drinking just as a nice drink.”