That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup: what is it exactly?
That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup is an independent Los Angeles streetwear brand started by rapper Desto Dubb. The label reduces to ALOCS, a short form used across its press material and present in product names such as the A.L.O.C.S. T-Shirt. The range is ordinary on paper, covering 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. The legal entity is filed as THATS A AWFUL LOT OF… LLC, with no apostrophe and a trailing ellipsis. A dozen spellings lead shoppers to it, including alocs clothing, cough syrup clothing and the shorthand awful lot of cough syrup. Before anything cough syrup t shirt else, note this: the brand writes “A Awful Lot”, not “An Awful Lot”, and the ungrammatical article is a choice. It is common to type thats a awful lot of cough syrup without the apostrophe, yet only the version with “A” corresponds to the registered mark.
Who is behind it?
Desto Dubb, a rapper and entrepreneur from Watts in South Los Angeles, is the founder and the chief executive. He had been putting out records for years before he sold a shirt, which illuminates much of how the company conducts itself. What you are looking at is not a design studio with a rapper attached as a face, but a rapper’s business, run from the same orbit 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 see the result in graphics that read like song titles and in drops timed 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. The internet hints at more about his legal name than the record carries, and that record is slim. Unsourced commercial sites carry other names, and those are best left alone, because for every practical purpose he is Desto Dubb.
Where does the name come from?
The public came across the phrase through a viral clip in which an officer’s line became the brand name, and Desto Dubb made that line into a business. Nearly every write-up carries 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.
What the phrase means is 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 !”. Medical and horror imagery cuts through the product names, from Big Pharma and Promethazine Tour to Paralysis and Drankenstein, as a graphic vocabulary rather than an instruction. The clothing is clothing, and the rest of this piece is about garments and prices.
When did the label 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 puts the earliest selling during the pandemic, which conflicts with both markers, and the filing and the anniversary piece are the stronger pair. Two independent pointers to one year is more than most young streetwear brands can manage.
The beginning was literally a van. The brand’s own about page recounts 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 describes 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 is actually on the rail?
Heavyweight cut-and-sew basics bearing jumbo screen prints front and back are the core. Hoodies are the heavy end, the Classic Cough Syrup Hoodie listed at 16 oz organic cotton and hand-dyed in Los Angeles, while sweatpants use a 14 oz cotton and recycled polyester fleece. Tee names take in King Of The Kill, Drankenstein, Juicebusters and Big Pharma, and the Classic Cough Syrup T-Shirt is 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.
Two details identify the brand better than any graphic: 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 varies by garment and is not uniform: the classic pieces are called true to size, while the lightweight jersey tees say plainly that they run small.
What are the prices?
Because they barely move, the core prices are easy to hold in your head. As of September 2026, a tee is about $150 at the brand’s own store, a hoodie about $200 and sweatpants about $200. Near $150 buys denim shorts, puffer jackets run between roughly $200 and $250, belts and Dickies trousers around $250, and the Dickies jacket tops the range near $350. At the lower end a bandana runs about $25, socks and boxers fall in the $50 to $70 band, and women’s pieces roughly $48 to $160.
Because streetwear prices and stock change constantly, take that ladder as a shape rather than a quote. Cough syrup clothing lands at the upper end of independent streetwear on that band, well above mall-tier graphic brands and far below European luxury houses. It doubles as an authenticity signal: a $45 tee wearing this logo did not come from the company selling them at $150.
Where is it produced, and where can you buy it?
Los Angeles, which the brand declares on the garments themselves. “Made in Los Angeles” is repeated in the product copy, and individual pieces are described as hand-dyed and printed or screen-printed in the city rather than finished abroad. That same copy names the company a Black-owned business. At these price levels local small-batch production explains the numbers, since a 16 oz cotton hoodie made here was never going to be a $60 garment.
Alongside a small number of physical locations the company runs its own online store. At 7669 Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles sits the flagship, and the company also lists 312 West 5th Street in Los Angeles and 5410 Almeda Road in Houston. No store-locator page and no published opening hours exist, which makes those addresses worth confirming before travelling. The garment is the best test for anything else claiming to be an outlet: 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 table below gathers the details that survive checking and leaves out the ones that do not. The prices were read from the brand’s own store in September 2026 and are hedged, since they move. Dates come from the trademark record and dated press coverage rather than brand mythology. Those addresses are the ones the company lists on its own social profiles, and no opening dates are published. Where a claim is contested, such as the origin clip, the row records what is documented. It works best as a starting point for your own checks rather than a final word.
| Entry | The record |
|---|---|
| Brand name, the company’s own spelling | That’s A Awful Lot Of Cough Syrup |
| Abbreviation | ALOCS, also written A.L.O.C.S. |
| Spellings people commonly type | thats a awful lot of cough syrup, awful lot of cough syrup, alocs |
| Legal entity | THATS A AWFUL LOT OF… LLC |
| Founder of the label | Desto Dubb, rapper and businessman |
| Where the founder is from | Watts, South Los Angeles |
| Registered trademark owner | Joshua Kashif Taylor, according to the US trademark record |
| Date of first use | November 2018 |
| How it started | Trading out of a van in a downtown Los Angeles parking lot |
| Signature details | Yellow woven label, alongside jumbo front and back screen prints |
| The core price band, September 2026 | Tees about $150, hoodies about $200, sweatpants about $200 |
| Manufacturing | Made in Los Angeles, presented in product copy as a Black-owned business |
| The flagship | 7669 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles |
| The other listed addresses | 312 West 5th Street, Los Angeles; 5410 Almeda Road, Houston |