That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup: what is the label?
Launched by the LA rapper Desto Dubb, That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup is an indie streetwear brand working out of Los Angeles. The label compresses to ALOCS, a contraction printed through its press material and built into item names such as the A.L.O.C.S. T-Shirt. The range is ordinary on paper, taking in tees, hoodies, sweatpants, shorts, denim and accessories, and peculiar in practice, since the brand’s own name is the leading graphic on most of it. Shoppers search for it under a dozen spelling variants, including alocs clothing, cough syrup clothing and the shorthand awful lot of cough syrup. On the record the company is ALOCS THATS A AWFUL LOT OF… LLC, with no apostrophe and a trailing ellipsis. Clear one detail up first: the brand writes “A Awful Lot”, not “An Awful Lot”, and that ungrammatical article is quite deliberate. Plenty of people type thats a awful lot of cough syrup without the apostrophe, but only the version with “A” matches the registered mark.
Who is the brand?
Desto Dubb, who grew up in Watts in South Los Angeles and makes his living as a rapper and entrepreneur, is the founder and the chief executive. He was making records years before he sold a shirt, which tells you a great deal about how the company conducts itself. It is not a design studio that attached a rapper as a face; it is a rapper’s business, operated from the same crowd as his records. He has characterised other labels as built around an aesthetic, and his own as wrapped around himself instead. The result comes out in graphics that read like song titles and in drops keyed to events rather than fashion seasons.
The United States trademark for the phrase is registered to Joshua Kashif Taylor, and posts on the brand’s own blog carry a matching byline. His legal name is a thinner record than the internet implies. Other names circulate on unsourced commercial sites and are best left alone, since for every practical purpose he is Desto Dubb.
Where did the name come from?
A viral clip pushed the phrase into circulation, an officer’s line became the brand name, and Desto Dubb made that line into a business. Nearly every write-up retells the anecdote, and it deserves care, because material online claims the clip was staged and no primary transcript settles it. Documentation is confined to the commercial outcome rather than the encounter, and the trademark record gives first use of the mark in November 2018.
The phrase itself points at promethazine-codeine cough syrup, the prescription medicine known in rap slang as lean, and the company does not pretend otherwise. Nor does it treat that as a selling point: its own site carries a standing banner reading “! PLEASE DO NOT SIP DRANK AND SHOOT FIREARMS !”. The product names are full of medical and horror imagery, from Big Pharma and Promethazine Tour to Paralysis and Drankenstein, a graphic vocabulary rather than an instruction. The clothing is clothing, and the remainder of this piece deals with garments and prices.
When did the brand start?
The year to use is 2018. Two records agree: the trademark filing gives first use of the mark in November 2018, and an AllHipHop profile published in November 2023 describes the label marking its fifth anniversary. There is coverage placing the earliest selling during the pandemic, but that conflicts with both markers, and the filing and the anniversary piece are the stronger pair. Having two independent pointers to a single year is more than most young streetwear brands can manage.
The beginning was literally a van. The brand’s own about page has Desto Dubb selling clothes out of a van in a parking lot in downtown Los Angeles, which is the origin it tells on itself rather than one assembled by a reporter. The method is still summed up by that detail: small batches, direct contact with buyers, and drops announced through social accounts instead of wholesale calendars. The company runs an online store and physical retail by 2026, but the rhythm still looks closer to a van than a department store, with fresh batches landing every week or two.
What does it actually make?
The core is heavyweight cut-and-sew basics bearing jumbo screen prints front and back. The heavy end is hoodies: the Classic Cough Syrup Hoodie is listed at 16 oz organic cotton and hand-dyed in Los Angeles, and sweatpants use a 14 oz cotton and recycled polyester fleece. Tees work through names like King Of The Kill, Drankenstein, Juicebusters and Big Pharma, with the Classic Cough Syrup T-Shirt published at 6.5 oz organic cotton. The denim side is deliberately thin, since the Double Cup Cargo Shorts, a 14 oz garment-dyed cargo short with double-layer back pockets, is the only piece in that collection in 2026.
The brand is given away less by any graphic than by two details: the signature yellow woven label, named again and again in its own product copy, and the published fabric weight. Apparel spans XS to 3XL, denim and workwear sell by waist from 28 to 44, and neither a global size chart nor washing instructions is published. Fit guidance is set per garment and is not uniform, since the classic pieces are called true to size while the lightweight jersey tees say plainly that they run small.
How much does it cost?
Because they barely move, the core prices are easy to hold in your head. Reading the brand’s own store as of September 2026, a tee is about $150, a hoodie about $200 and sweatpants about $200. Denim shorts sit near $150, puffer jackets between roughly $200 and $250, belts and Dickies trousers around $250, and the Dickies jacket tops the range near $350. At the other end a bandana runs about $25, socks and boxers fall in the $50 to $70 band, and women’s pieces roughly $48 to $160.
Streetwear prices and stock change constantly, so treat that ladder as a shape rather than a quote. The band places cough syrup clothing at the upper end of independent streetwear, well above mall-tier graphic brands and far below European luxury houses. It is likewise an authenticity signal: a $45 tee wearing this logo did not come from the company selling them at $150.
Where does it come from, and where can you buy it?
Los Angeles, and the brand states it on the garments themselves. Across the product copy “Made in Los Angeles” recurs, and individual pieces are described as hand-dyed and printed or screen-printed in the city rather than finished abroad. A Black-owned business is how the same copy describes the company. Given local small-batch production, the numbers at these price levels add up, because a 16 oz cotton hoodie made here was never going to be a $60 garment.
Its own online store runs alongside a small number of physical locations. At 7669 Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles stands the flagship, and the company also lists 312 West 5th Street in Los Angeles and 5410 Almeda Road in Houston. There is no store-locator page and no published opening hours, so those addresses are worth confirming before travelling. Anything else that calls itself an outlet is best judged on the garment, meaning the yellow woven label, the published fabric weight, the real price level, and whether the product name appears in the brand’s own catalogue.
A brand fact file
The details that survive checking are gathered in the table below, and the ones that do not are left out. Dates come from the trademark record and dated press coverage rather than brand mythology. Prices were read from the brand’s own store in September 2026 and are hedged, because they move. Those addresses are the ones the company lists on its own social profiles, and no opening dates are published. When a claim is contested, as the origin clip is, the row records what is documented. Treat it as a starting point for your own checks rather than a final word.
| Detail line | The record |
|---|---|
| Brand name, the company’s own spelling | That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup |
| Shorthand form | ALOCS, sometimes written A.L.O.C.S. |
| Common spellings searchers use | thats a awful lot of cough syrup, awful lot of cough syrup, alocs |
| The legal entity | THATS A AWFUL LOT OF… LLC |
| The founder | Desto Dubb, rapper and businessman |
| Where the founder grew up | Watts, South Los Angeles |
| Trademark owner of record | Joshua Kashif Taylor, as recorded in the US trademark record |
| First recorded use of the mark | November 2018 |
| How it began | Sales from a van in a downtown Los Angeles parking lot |
| The telltale detail | Yellow woven label, and jumbo front and back screen prints |
| Main prices, September 2026 | Tees about $150, hoodies about $200, sweatpants about $200 |
| Manufacturing | Made in Los Angeles, called in product copy a Black-owned business |
| The flagship | 7669 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles |
| Other locations listed | 312 West 5th Street, Los Angeles; 5410 Almeda Road, Houston |
