A cold drink in hot weather is like a blessing. Not only does it quench your thirst and hydrate you but also it gives you the necessary refreshment you are looking for. As in hot weather, we intentionally or unintentionally consume a good amount of drinks, it needs to be healthy.
A lot of brands came forward to provide us with some of the finest drinks. Unfortunately, some drinks have to say goodbye for some corporate reasons. Tab soda is one of those drinks that are not among us anymore.
Let us remember this drink and talk about who made Tab Soda and what that drink offered when it was available in the market.
About Tab
The Tab is one of many of Coca-Cola’s fantastic product lineups, a diet cola soft drink. Tab drink was first introduced in 1963 and unfortunately sold its last batch in 2020. Tab soda saw its golden era in the 60s and 70s.
The caffeine-free and clear variants of Tab’s product were first introduced in the late 1980s or early 1990s. The primary sweetener in Tab, saccharine, was found to be carcinogenic to rats.
When it was established that saccharines cannot cause cancer in humans, the United States Congress forced Tab to remove the warning label from their drinks. Diet Coke is to blame for Tab’s declining popularity and subsequent elimination.
Tab Soda was manufactured and distributed by our favorite soft drink brand, Coca-Cola. Is Tab Soda still available? No, Coca-cola discontinued its service in 2020.
About The Manufacturer
The Coca-Cola Company is the world’s most famous beverage manufacturer. Although the Coca-cola company has a vast range of drinks under its management, the brand is most famous for manufacturing Coca-Cola.
The Coca-Cola Company is a publicly-traded company that is listed on the NYSE, and a part of DJIA, S&P 100, and S&P 500 index. The main ingredients of Coca-Cola at the dawn of its invention were cocaine from coca leaves and caffeine from Kola nuts. Hence, the name Coca-Cola.
Coca-Cola was not the soft drink we knew it started its journey as a tonic for medical uses. Coca-Cola is also responsible for providing jobs to a great number of people. Coca-Cola’s drinks can be found globally.
All About Tab Soda
Although Tab has lost its popularity, it had a cult following. So, how was Tab Soda? We will talk about some interesting facts about this drink and check out how was it.
🔹 What is Tab Drink?
Before we start analyzing a Tab Soda let us talk about what Tab stands for. Tab means artificially beverage. The naming came from the usage of artificial sweetener saccharin, that’s why it is called artificial beverage.
It has that similar soft, bubbly taste to other popular soft drinks, the great thing was Tab has lower calories than most soft drinks. Tab marketed itself saying “Everything you want without sugar” emphasizing its ingredients.
🔹 Ingredients
We somehow managed to have an old Tab soda can in one of our friend’s collections. According to the packaging Tab Soda ingredients are:
- Carbonated Water,
- Caramel Color,
- Natural Flavors,
- Phosphoric Acid,
- Calcium Saccharin, and many more.
🔹 Discontinuation
It is no surprise that every big corporation has to keep improving its product and come up with new and fresh ideas. Coca-Cola was no different from that. Coca-Cola created alternative zero-calorie drinks like zero sugar and diet coke plus.
Those alternative drinks were offering more sugar-like tastes than Tab soda and gaining more popularity. The declining popularity also affects the sales as Tab’s sales were declining. A Coca-Cola spokesperson has told this is “the future of business” as those alternatives were better.
As various reports mentioned, obesity is the root cause of diabetes and many deadly diseases. As a result, the consumer was shifting their focus to zero sugar diet cola and sparkling water. Those were also some reasons why we don’t see Tab Soda anymore.
🔹 Tab Soda Vs Diet Coke
Now, as we have mentioned Diet coke was a big reason why Tab soda was discontinued. Your next question is, how different was Tab soda from diet coke. Initially, Tab soda used saccharine and cyclamates equally as an artificial sweetener without any effect.
Back in the day, sugar was thought of as the root cause of many problems like causing cavities. When scientists found out that sugar does not cause such problems, Tab switched its recipe again.
In contrast, diet coke was Coca-attempt Cola’s to market a calorie-free soft drink. Diet Coke was first introduced in the 1980s, and through time this soft drink evolved into a zero-calorie beverage from low-calorie beverages while maintaining a taste similar to those with sugar.
Tab soda contained the same amount of caffeine as decaffeinated coffee whereas a zero sugar or diet coke has around 40mg of caffeine in the drink.
🔹 Tastes
There has been a lot of blather about tab soda, but what does it taste like? The original diet coke was Tab Soda, and it still tastes wonderful today. As you would have predicted, there were some problems with the ingredients in Tab soda, and it underwent several modifications.
The Taste of Tab was unique, we can’t describe it how it was as we don’t have any drinks that have similar tastes to Tab soda. You will still get those common tastes as regular diet cokes like less sweet and more bubbly.
Conclusion
Obesity is a curse to our nation, a healthy food habit is a requirement to lead a healthy life always. Zero-calorie drinks help us to get hydrated while balancing our calorie consumption. Tab Soda was one of the pioneers in this sector.
Even though we can no longer consume tab soda, people still remember it for its distinctive flavor. Tab Soda will continue to be a significant breakthrough in the soft drink market, even though many people might have missed it.
