Product Code Database
Fresca is a grapefruit-flavored citrus soft drink created by The Coca-Cola Company. Borrowing the word Fresca (meaning "fresh") from Italian language, Spanish language, and Portuguese, it was introduced in the United States in 1966. Originally a bottled sugar-free diet soda, sugar sweetened versions were introduced in some markets.
Fresca competed primarily against Squirt.
Since its introduction, Fresca has been marketed in the United States as a sugar-free, citrus (lime and grapefruit) flavored Diet soda soft drink. In 1966 then Coca-Cola Company president J. Paul Austin announced the company's profits had doubled since 1959 and said "Other developments, notably the introduction of Fresca, now underway, promise further advancement in the refreshment industry".
Multiple references in contemporary newspapers and Coca-Cola corporate websites refer to a wide 1966 US and international rollout of the Fresca soft drink brand.
In 1967 Larrie L. Isenring, general manager of the Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Madison (Wisconsin) said the "newly introduced Fresca and pre-brewed coffee were the company's fastest growing products".
Sales of Fresca quickly exploded. By March 1967, Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc. forecast increasing profits for Coca-Cola, saying "we believe Fresca... may be the nation's number three soft drink by the end of the year".
In 1968, it was introduced into the Australian market under the name Tresca, where it was solidly marketed as a diet drink.
By 1969, Fresca had the highest market share of all artificially sweetened soft drinks in America.
The agency's unifying theme for the brand's marketing centered around Fresca having a "blizzard" of "frosty taste". The soda was said to be "cool, crisp, frosty and refreshing". A 1966 newspaper ad headline read "Here. The frosty taste of Fresca. It's a blizzard". The ad copy used 25 adjectives to describe Fresca's "blizzard taste".
The Miller record "Mitch Miller – Singin' Up A Blizzard", featured a sleeve printed with the slogan "Hey gang, sing up a blizzard with us! Mitch". The reverse of the sleeve featured a headline "Have a Singing, Swing Blizzard of a Party With Fresca" and included recipes of food and mixed drinks that used Fresca as an ingredient. The Miller record was used in a promotion campaign which encouraged consumers to save Fresca bottle caps and redeem them for a copy of the record.
The Lopez record "Trini Lopez – Sings His Greatest Hits" featured three songs from Lopez' repertoire as well as his version of McFarland's "The Blizzard Song". This record was issued with a printed sleeve with an ad on the back that said "The frosty taste of Fresca. It's a blizzard!" The sleeve had a flap with a die-cut hole and was hung from a bottle in six and eight-pack bottle cartons of Fresca. The record was included at no charge.
The "Blizzard" campaign took advantage of an incredible, unplanned marketing opportunity. The day after the Four Seasons premiere, New York City received a foot of snow. Free took advantage of the snow storm and created memorable marketing for the new brand. Free was photographed holding a bottle of Fresca in the middle of the snow storm. His photograph appeared in full-page Fresca New York newspaper ads the next day with the headline "New York – We're Sorry".
Bravo network television host Andy Cohen often drinks a "Frequila" during his show. The cocktail is a mixture of Fresca and tequila.
David Plotz, former editor of online magazine Slate and founder and CEO of the local-news podcast network, City Cast is said to be "a hard-core addict of the citrus-flavored soft drink" Fresca.
Fresca is prominently featured in the superhero television series The Boys, where it is the favored drink of the Church of the Collective, leading to fan speculation as to its potential meaning. It was eventually revealed that the show's writers found it "hilarious" that cult members would drink Fresca, and it just became a running gag with no deeper meaning.
Fresca has undergone several major ingredient and formula changes since its introduction. Fresca was originally sweetened with cyclamates which were banned by the FDA in 1969. They were replaced with saccharin and in turn, they were replaced by NutraSweet-brand aspartame.
According to The Coca-Cola Company, in 1980 an improved Fresca formulation, supported by new packaging, brand graphics and advertising, reached full national availability. The brand refresh was supported by "the most extensive sampling program ever conducted for a soft drink product". Around the time of the 2005 Fresca redesign, acesulfame potassium was added as a secondary sweetener.
Coca-Cola marketed a sugar sweetened version of Fresca in Latin America. In 1997, The Coca-Cola Company responded to requests for this product from immigrant communities by launching it throughout the US as Fanta Citrus. This was a success but is instead sold as the Citrus flavor in Coca-Cola's Fanta line in areas with large Hispanic populations. In Colombia and Argentina sweetened Fresca is called Quatro and marketed using Fresca's colors and logos.
Fresca was made available in South Africa during the early 1990s with a series of colorful ads featuring British-Nigerian actor Hakeem Kae-Kazim with the slogan "Nothing tastes like Fresca". The soft drink developed a cult following but sales were discontinued.
Coca-Cola announced revamped packaging again in 2018 along with a new marketing campaign targeted towards millennials – the first Fresca advertising since 2008 – with the stated intention of "reeling in a new generation of drinkers unfamiliar with the brand". The marketing described it as a "sparkling flavored soda", meant to compete with other sparkling beverage products such as La Croix and Izze.
In 2018, Fresca also rebranded itself as "Fresca Sparkling Soda Water", reformulated in four flavors, Grapefruit Citrus, Black Cherry Citrus, Peach Citrus and Blackberry Citrus and described as "The original no sugar, no calorie sparkling beverage". In the US, Fresca is currently sold in plastic bottles and aluminum cans.
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