What exactly is That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup?
Rapper Desto Dubb founded That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup, an independent streetwear brand out of Los Angeles. The label reduces to ALOCS, an abbreviation found in its press material and visible in item names such as the A.L.O.C.S. T-Shirt. What the label sells reads unremarkable on paper, covering tees, hoodies, sweatpants, shorts, denim and accessories, yet odd in practice, since the brand’s own name is the main graphic on most of it. Set down as THATS A AWFUL LOT OF… LLC, the legal entity carries no apostrophe and a trailing ellipsis. Shoppers find it under a dozen spelling variants, including alocs clothing, cough syrup clothing awfullottacoughsyrup.com/product-category/t-shirts and the shorthand awful lot of cough syrup. One detail is worth getting straight first: the brand writes “A Awful Lot”, not “An Awful Lot”, and the ungrammatical article is on purpose. Plenty of people type thats a awful lot of cough syrup without the apostrophe, but only the version with “A” fits the registered mark.
Who runs the label?
The founder and chief executive is Desto Dubb, a rapper and entrepreneur from Watts in South Los Angeles. Music came years before the first shirt, and that explains much of how the company conducts itself. It is not a design studio that attached a rapper as a face; it is a rapper’s business, run from the same crowd as his records. He has put it that other labels are built around an aesthetic, and that his own is wrapped around himself instead. You notice the result in graphics that read like song titles and in drops keyed to events rather than fashion seasons.
The internet implies more about his legal name than the record carries, and that record is scant. 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. Unsourced commercial sites circulate other names, and those are best left alone, because for every practical purpose he is Desto Dubb.
Where did the name originate?
A viral clip pushed the phrase into circulation, an officer’s line became the brand name, and Desto Dubb turned 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. The commercial outcome is what is documented, rather than the encounter itself, and the trademark record gives first use of the mark in November 2018.
The phrase refers to 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 displays a standing banner reading “! PLEASE DO NOT SIP DRANK AND SHOOT FIREARMS !”. Medical and horror imagery is scattered across the product names, from Big Pharma and Promethazine Tour to Paralysis and Drankenstein, and it works as a graphic vocabulary rather than an instruction. The clothing is clothing, and the remainder of this piece covers garments and prices.
What year did it start?
Use 2018. 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. Some coverage places the earliest selling during the pandemic, which conflicts with both markers, and the filing and the anniversary piece are the stronger pair. Most young streetwear brands cannot manage two independent pointers to one year.
The start was literally a van. The brand’s own about page describes 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. That detail still defines the method: small batches, direct contact with buyers, and drops announced through social accounts instead of wholesale calendars. By 2026 the company runs an online store and physical retail, yet the rhythm still looks closer to a van than a department store, with fresh batches landing every week or two.
What does the brand actually sell?
Heavyweight cut-and-sew basics bearing jumbo screen prints front and back are the core. 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.
Better than any graphic, two details identify the brand, namely the signature yellow woven label, invoked again and again in its own product copy, and the published fabric weight. Apparel goes 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.
What are the prices?
The core prices shift hardly at all, which makes them easy to hold in your head. A tee is about $150 at the brand’s own store as of September 2026, 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 bottom 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. That band sets cough syrup clothing at the upper end of independent streetwear, well above mall-tier graphic brands and far below European luxury houses. The band also acts as an authenticity signal, since 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, which the brand prints on the garments themselves. The product copy repeats “Made in Los Angeles”, with individual pieces described as hand-dyed and printed or screen-printed in the city rather than finished abroad. The same copy also characterises the company as a Black-owned business. Given local small-batch production, the numbers at these price levels make sense, because a 16 oz cotton hoodie made here was never going to be a $60 garment.
Alongside a small number of physical locations the company keeps its own online store. The flagship is at 7669 Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles, and it also lists 312 West 5th Street in Los Angeles and 5410 Almeda Road in Houston. No store-locator page and no published opening hours are provided, which makes those addresses worth confirming before travelling. Judge anything else claiming to be an outlet on the garment itself: the yellow woven label, the published fabric weight, the real price level, and whether the product name appears in the brand’s own catalogue.
The brand fact file
The details that survive checking are gathered in the table below, and the ones that do not are left out. The dates are sourced from the trademark record and dated press coverage rather than brand mythology. The prices were pulled from the brand’s own store in September 2026 and are hedged, since they move. The addresses given are the ones the company lists on its own social profiles, with no published opening dates. For a contested claim such as the origin clip, the row records what is documented. Treat it as a starting point for your own checks rather than a final word.
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| Brand name, as the brand spells it | That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup |
| Abbreviation | ALOCS, also written A.L.O.C.S. |
| Common searcher spellings | thats a awful lot of cough syrup, awful lot of cough syrup, alocs |
| Registered entity | THATS A AWFUL LOT OF… LLC |
| Founder and chief executive | Desto Dubb, rapper and businessman |
| Founder’s home | Watts, South Los Angeles |
| Registered trademark owner | Joshua Kashif Taylor, per the US trademark record |
| Date of first use | November 2018 |
| How it started | Sales from a van in a downtown Los Angeles parking lot |
| Signature details | Yellow woven label, plus jumbo front and back screen prints |
| Core prices, September 2026 | Tees about $150, hoodies about $200, sweatpants about $200 |
| Where it is made | Made in Los Angeles, called in product copy a Black-owned business |
| The flagship shop | 7669 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles |
| Further listed locations | 312 West 5th Street, Los Angeles; 5410 Almeda Road, Houston |