A group of friends saved £200 by smuggling alcohol to a festival – by injecting a liter of pink gin into a carton of cranberry juice.
Sophie Taylor, 20, a support worker from Durham and her friends, didn’t want to spend £8.50 for a double pink gin and lemonade at Kubix Festival in Sunderland last Saturday.
After spending £32.77 each for their festival tickets, the group of women came up with a genius but sneaky plan.
The girls bought two giant 50ml syringes from Amazon costing £5.99 and poked a hole in the side of a cranberry juice box and emptied the contents.
They filled the syringes with Gordon’s pink gin and poured the alcohol into the empty box of cranberry juice.
Full of Gin! Sophie Taylor, 20, a support worker from Durham, squirts a bottle of Gordon’s Pink Gin into Amazon’s 50ml syringes
Sophie Taylor, 20 (right), and her friends Becca Merrit, 24, (left) and Katie Hobson, 25 (center), refused to pay £8.50 for a double gin and lemonade at the Kubix Festival in Sunderland
The friends poked a small hole in the side of a box of Tesco cranberry juice, so it looked like the package hadn’t been opened
The intrepid friends managed to squirt an entire bottle of Gordon’s pink gin into the box
It took a bit of DIY with a glue gun to make the trick believable, when the friends snuck past security with 2 liters of gin hidden in plain sight
Sophie and her friends Becca Merrit, 24, and Katie Hobson, 25, walked past security with their disguised alcohol in plain sight in their tote bag.
The 20-year-old rescuer estimates that she and her friends “saved about £200.”
She said: ‘I’d seen someone put vodka in a water bottle and close it again, but I’m not a big fan of vodka, so I thought I’d do it with pink gin.
“Then I thought pink gin didn’t really look like anything, so that gave me the idea for the cranberry juice because it was a sealed package.
“The box holds a full one liter bottle of pink gin, so that would take us all day, as we were there from 12 noon to 11 p.m.
“The person who used the vodka in the water bottle put it in with a syringe and used a glue gun to cover it, so we took the syringes and did the same with the box.
‘We were really nervous, to be honest! We didn’t think we would get away with it but the effort we went to make sure it was still sealed and you couldn’t tell we had tampered with it, looking back now I’m not too surprised that we got away with it.
Mission accomplished. The cranberry juice was sealed again so it didn’t look like it had been tampered with
A crafty upgrade – the girls, thinking they’ve saved £200 at the festival, enjoy a cup of ‘cranberry’ juice
Sophie Taylor (left) Becca Merrit (center) and Katie Hobson (right) at Kubix Festival where they sneak the booze down. The trio admit they were surprised to get away with their trick
“When we first got through the checkpoint, security pulled us over to check our bags and picnic basket.
“The gin was in a bag with a blanket next to it, so after security had finished checking the picnic basket, they looked in the bag containing the gin but saw it was sealed and thought nothing of it.
‘Personally I thought the drinks were too expensive. It was £22 for a bottle of wine and £6 for a pint.
“The hack saved me and my friends about £200, so I’m glad we thought of it. I would definitely do it again.’
Sophie shared the video on TikTok Monday, writing: ‘We are doing everything we can to avoid paying £8.50 for a gin.’
The post has now racked up over 900,000 views with over 61,000 likes and 600 comments from users who loved the devious hack.
One user said, “I love these sneaky ways to get drinks.”
Sophie Taylor (center) with her friends Becca Merrit (left) and Katie Hobson (right) were determined to beat astronomical drink prices after spending £32.77 each on their festival tickets
Another admitted: ‘I work in security, now I know. I wouldn’t doubt this 100%, as I would do it myself.”
A third commented: ‘I don’t know why they don’t just let us drink our own booze, as long as it’s limited to one or two liters, because anyway, I’ll bring my own.’
A fourth added, “I’m not even going to ask why you own such a huge syringe.”
One member replied, “The dedication is impeccable.”
Another wrote: ‘Absolutely genius.’
An end user said, “That’s the best lifehack I’ve seen.”
Kubix Festival in Sunderland now lasts two weekends to cater to different music tastes.
Saturday’s pop and dance show was topped off on the main stage by 90s supergroup Steps.