Portal:Soft drinks
Portal maintenance status: (October 2018)
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Introduction
A soft drink (see Terminology for other names) is a drink that typically contains carbonated water (although some lemonades are not carbonated), a sweetener, and a natural or artificial flavoring. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a sugar substitute (in the case of diet drinks), or some combination of these. Soft drinks may also contain caffeine, colorings, preservatives, and/or other ingredients.
Soft drinks are called "soft" in contrast with "hard" alcoholic drinks. Small amounts of alcohol may be present in a soft drink, but the alcohol content must be less than 0.5% of the total volume of the drink if the drink is to be considered non-alcoholic. Fruit punch, tea (even kombucha), and other such non-alcoholic drinks are technically soft drinks by this definition, but are not generally referred to as such.
Selected general articles
Cola is a sweetened, carbonated soft drink flavored with vanilla, cinnamon, citrus oils and other flavorings. Most contain caffeine, which was originally sourced from the kola nut, leading to the drink's name, though other sources are now also used. Cola became popular worldwide after pharmacist John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola in 1886. His non-alcoholic recipe was inspired by the coca wine of pharmacist Angelo Mariani, created in 1863.
Most modern colas usually contain caramel color, and are sweetened with sugar or high-fructose corn syrup. They now come in numerous different brands. Among them, the most popular are Coca-Cola and Pepsi. These two companies have been competing since the 1890s, but their rivalry has intensified since the 1980s. Read more...- Sports drinks are beverages whose stated purpose is to help athletes replace water, electrolytes, and energy before and after training or competition, though their efficiency for that purpose has been questioned, particularly after exercise. Read more...
- Cott Corporation is a beverage and foodservice company based in Canada. Cott's platform across North America and Europe is supported by sales and distribution facilities and fleets, as well as wholesalers and distributors, servicing residences, businesses, restaurant chains, hotels and motels, small and large retailers, and healthcare facilities. In bottled water, Cott offers brands including Sparkletts, Hinckley Springs, Kentwood Springs, Canadian Springs, Labrador, and Eden Springs. In office coffee services, Cott offers products under brands including Keurig, Mars Alterra, Starbucks Coffee, Caribou Coffee, Peet's Coffee & Tea, Javarama, and Lavazza. In coffee roasting and tea blending, Cott sells the majority of its manufactured coffee and tea products under retailer or foodservice brands to customers who own the trademarks associated with those products. Read more...
An energy drink is a type of drink containing sugar and stimulant compounds, usually caffeine, which is marketed as providing mental and physical stimulation (marketed as "energy", but distinct from food energy). They may or may not be carbonated and may also contain other sweeteners, herbal extracts, taurine, and amino acids. They are a subset of the larger group of energy products, which includes bars and gels, and distinct from sports drinks, which are advertised to enhance sports performance. There are many brands and varieties in this drink category.
Coffee, tea and other naturally caffeinated drinks are usually not considered energy drinks. Other soft drinks such as cola may contain caffeine, but are not considered energy drinks either. Some alcoholic drinks, such as Buckfast Tonic Wine, contain caffeine and other stimulants. According to the Mayo Clinic, it is safe for the typical healthy adult to consume a total of 400 mg of caffeine a day. This has been confirmed by a panel of the European Food Safety Authority, which also concludes that a caffeine intake of up to 400 mg per day does not raise safety concerns for adults. According to the ESFA this is equivalent to 4 cups of coffee (90 mg each) or 5 standard cans (250 ml) of energy drink (80 mg each). Read more...- A sugary drink tax or soda tax is a tax or surcharge designed to reduce consumption of drinks with added sugar. Drinks covered under a soda tax often include carbonated soft drinks, sports drinks and energy drinks.
The tax is a matter of public debate in many countries and beverage producers like Coca-Cola often oppose it. Advocates such as national medical associations and the World Health Organization promote the tax as an example of Pigovian taxation, aimed to discourage unhealthy diets and offset the growing economic costs of obesity. Read more...
A glass of Vernors ginger ale
Ginger ale is a carbonated soft drink flavoured with ginger. It is drunk on its own or used as a mixer, often with spirit-based drinks. There are two main types of ginger ale. The golden style is credited to the Irish doctor, Thomas Joseph Cantrell. The dry style (also called the pale style) is a paler drink with a much milder ginger flavour, was created by Canadian John McLaughlin. Read more...- A fat tax is a tax or surcharge that is placed upon fattening food, beverages or on overweight individuals. It is considered an example of Pigovian taxation. A fat tax aims to discourage unhealthy diets and offset the economic costs of obesity.
A fat tax aims to decrease the consumption of foods that are linked to obesity. A related idea is to tax foods that are linked to increased risk of coronary heart disease. Numerous studies suggest that as the price of a food decreases, individuals get fatter. In fact, eating behavior may be more responsive to price increases than to nutritional education. Estimates suggest that a 1 cent per ounce tax on sugar-sweetened beverages may reduce the consumption of those beverages by 25%. However, there is also evidence that obese individuals are less responsive to changes in the price of food than normal-weight individuals. Read more...
Lemon-lime drinks, also known colloquially as lemonade in Australia and New Zealand and as cider in Japan and Korea, are carbonated soft drinks with lemon and lime flavoring. Popular brands include Sprite, 7 Up, and Sierra Mist. Read more...
PepsiCo's global headquarters building from the Donald M. Kendall Sculpture Gardens in Harrison, New York, in the hamlet of Purchase
PepsiCo, Inc. is an American multinational food, snack, and beverage corporation headquartered in Harrison, New York, in the hamlet of Purchase. PepsiCo has interests in the manufacturing, marketing, and distribution of grain-based snack foods, beverages, and other products. PepsiCo was formed in 1965 with the merger of the Pepsi-Cola Company and Frito-Lay, Inc. PepsiCo has since expanded from its namesake product Pepsi to a broader range of food and beverage brands, the largest of which included an acquisition of Tropicana Products in 1998 and the Quaker Oats Company in 2001, which added the Gatorade brand to its portfolio.
As of January 26, 2012, 22 of PepsiCo's brands generated retail sales of more than $1 billion apiece, and the company's products were distributed across more than 200 countries, resulting in annual net revenues of $43.3 billion. Based on net revenue, PepsiCo is the second largest food and beverage business in the world. Within North America, PepsiCo is the largest food and beverage business by net revenue. Indra Nooyi has been the chief executive of PepsiCo since 2006. The company's beverage distribution and bottling is conducted by PepsiCo as well as by licensed bottlers in certain regions. Read more...
A glass of Barr orangeade
Orange soft drinks (called orange soda in certain regions of the United States and Canada, orangeade in the UK, or the genericised trademark orangina in France) are carbonated orange drinks.
Non-carbonated orangeade, i.e. the direct orange analogue of lemonade, is also made, with brands such as Minute Maid, and blends like cherry orangeade and lemon-orangeade are also made in some places, with recipes being commonly available. Read more...- Diet (alternatively marketed as sugar-free, zero-calorie or low-calorie) drinks are sugar-free, artificially sweetened versions of fizzy beverages with virtually no calories. They are generally marketed toward health-conscious people, diabetics, athletes, and other people who want to lose weight, improve physical fitness, or reduce their sugar intake. However, studies show that the marketed effectiveness of diet soft drinks is questionable. Read more...
Assortment of ginger beer bottles containing Moscow Herbal, Bundaberg, Aqua Monaco, Thomas Henry, Goldberg and Fever-Tree bottles.
Traditional ginger beer is a naturally sweetened and carbonated, usually non-alcoholic beverage. It is produced by the natural fermentation of prepared ginger spice, yeast and sugar.
Its origins date from the colonial spice trade with the Orient and the sugar producing islands of the Caribbean. It was popular in Britain and its colonies from the 18th century. Other spices were variously added and any alcohol content was limited to 2% by excise tax laws in 1855. Few brewers have maintained an alcoholic product. Read more...- Dr Pepper Snapple Group is an American soft drink company based in Plano, Texas, and as of July 2018 it is a business unit of the newly formed publicly traded conglomerate Keurig Dr Pepper.
Formerly Cadbury Schweppes Americas Beverages, part of Cadbury Schweppes, on May 5, 2008 it was spun off from Cadbury Schweppes as Dr Pepper Snapple Group, with trading in its shares starting on May 7, 2008 on the NYSE as "DPS". The remainder of Cadbury Schweppes become Cadbury, a confectionery group, on May 5, 2008. Read more... - This article is a list of brand name soft drink products. In some cases, the relevant article is the parent brand or brand family. Read more...
- The cola wars are a series of mutually-targeted television advertisements and marketing campaigns since the 1980s between two long-time rival soft drink producers, The Coca-Cola Company and PepsiCo. The battle between the two dominant brands in the United States intensified to such an extent that the term “Cola wars” was used to describe the feud. Each employed numerous advertising and marketing campaigns to outdo the other.
Short periods of intense competition between the two firms contrast with how the two firms avoid competition most of the time by focusing on different consumers, sponsoring different sports, differentiating their logos, choosing different colors for their packaging, and building different images for their brand. Read more...
Lemonade can be any one of a variety of sweetened beverages found throughout the world, but which are traditionally all characterized by a lemon flavor.
Most lemonade varieties can be separated into two distinct types: cloudy or clear; each is known simply as "lemonade" (or a cognate) in countries where dominant. Cloudy lemonade, generally found in North America and South Asia, is traditionally a homemade drink using lemon juice, water, and a sweetener such as cane sugar or honey. In the United Kingdom and Australia, clear lemonade, which is typically also carbonated, dominates. Read more...
Soda jerk passing ice cream soda between two soda fountains.
An ice cream float or ice cream soda (United States, United Kingdom, Canada, South Africa and East Asia), coke float (United Kingdom and Southeast Asia), or spider (Australia and New Zealand), is a chilled beverage that consists of ice cream in either a soft drink or in a mixture of flavored syrup and carbonated water. When root beer and ice cream are used together to make the beverage, it is typically referred to as a root beer float (United States and Canada). Read more...
The Coca-Cola Company is an American corporation, and manufacturer, retailer, and marketer of nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups. The company is best known for its flagship product Coca-Cola, invented in 1886 by pharmacist John Stith Pemberton in Atlanta, Georgia. The Coca-Cola formula and brand were bought in 1894 by Asa Griggs Candler (December 30, 1851 – March 12, 1929), who incorporated The Coca-Cola Company. The company—headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, but incorporated in Wilmington, Delaware—has operated a franchised distribution system since 1889: the Company only produces syrup concentrate, which is then sold to various bottlers throughout the world who hold exclusive territories. The company owns its anchor bottler in North America, Coca-Cola Refreshments.
The company's stock is listed on the NYSE and is part of DJIA, the S&P 500 index, the Russell 1000 Index, and the Russell 1000 Growth Stock Index. Muhtar Kent serves as chairman of the company with James Quincey as president and chief executive officer. Read more...- Cream soda is a sweet carbonated soft drink. Traditionally flavored with vanilla and raspberry and based on the taste of a classic soda, a wide range of variations can be found worldwide. Read more...
- Grape drinks (also known as grape soda, grape pop, or purple drink in certain regions of the U.S.) are sweetened drinks with a grape flavor and a deep purple color. They may be carbonated (for example, Fanta) or not (Kool-Aid).
Grapeade first appeared as a variety of carbonated drink provided in soda fountains in American drugstores in the late nineteenth century, brands including Miner's and Lash's. A recipe for homemade grapeade appears in editions of Fannie Farmer's cookbook. Read more... - In every area of the world there are major soft drink producers. However a few major North American companies are present in most of the countries of the world, such as Pepsi and Coca Cola. Read more...
A soft drink is a beverage that typically contains carbonated water, one or more flavourings and sweeteners such as sugar, HFCS, fruit juices, and/or sugar substitutes such as sucralose, acesulfame-K, aspartame and cyclamate. Soft drinks may also contain caffeine, colorings, preservatives and other ingredients. Read more...
A glass of Japanese Calpis
This is a list of soft drinks in order of the brand's country of origin. A soft drink is a beverage that typically contains water (often, but not always, carbonated water), usually a sweetener and usually a flavoring agent. The sweetener may be sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, sugar substitutes (in the case of diet drinks) or some combination of these. Soft drinks may also contain caffeine, colorings, preservatives and other ingredients.
Note: soft drinks that are sold in more than one country are listed in this article only under their country of origin. Read more...
Root beer is a sweet North American soft drink traditionally made using the sassafras tree Sassafras albidum (sassafras) or the vine Smilax ornata (sarsaparilla) as the primary flavor. Root beer may be alcoholic or non-alcoholic (but it is usually non-alcoholic), come naturally free of caffeine or have caffeine added, and be carbonated or non-carbonated. It usually has a thick, foamy head when poured. Modern, commercially produced root beer is generally sweet, foamy, carbonated, nonalcoholic, and flavored using artificial sassafras flavoring. Sassafras root is still used to flavor traditional root beer, but since sassafras was banned by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration due to the carcinogenicity of its constituent safrole, most commercial recipes do not contain sassafras. Some commercial root beers do use a safrole-free sassafras extract. Major producers include Dr Pepper Snapple Group, Coca-Cola, Sprecher Brewing, Dad’s Root Beer, Berghoff Beer, Whole Foods Market, and Stewart’s Restaurants. Read more...
Did you know...
- ... that Galco's Soda Pop Stop in Los Angeles carries more than 700 different soft drinks?
- ... that Mexican actor and professional wrestler Tonina Jackson was so popular that a soft drink was named after him?
- ... that among Stanley Gelbier's writings on pediatric dentistry is a 1962 study of tooth erosion in a boy who drank copious amounts of cola and soft drinks?
- ... that American Civil War Confederate surgeon Charles T. Pepper was the original inspiration for the Dr Pepper soft drink (1910 logo shown)?
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Selected images
Equipment used by Joseph Priestley in his experiments on gases and the carbonation of water
An 1883 advertisement for Schweppes Mineral-Waters
The Codd-neck bottle provided an effective seal for soft drinks in the late 19th century
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