Type | Root Beer |
---|---|
Manufacturer | Keurig Dr Pepper (United States, Worldwide) A&W Canada, Coca-Cola Canada Bottling Company (Canada) Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines (Philippine restaurant only) |
Country of origin | United States |
Introduced | 1919 |
Related products | Barq's, Mug Root Beer, Dad's Root Beer, Hires Root Beer, A&W Cream Soda |
Website | www |
Nutritional value per 8.1 fl oz / 1 cup / 240 ml | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Energy | 120 kcal (500 kJ) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
31 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Sugars | 31 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dietary fiber | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
0 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Saturated | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Trans | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
0 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Other constituents | Quantity | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Cholesterol | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
†Percentages estimated using US recommendations for adults, [1] except for potassium, which is estimated based on expert recommendation from the National Academies. [2] |
A&W Root Beer is an American brand of root beer that was founded in 1919 by Roy W. Allen [3] and primarily available in the United States and Canada. Allen partnered with Frank Wright in 1922, creating the A&W brand and inspiring a chain of A&W Restaurants founded that year. Originally, A&W Root Beer sold for five cents (equivalent to $0.88in 2023). [4]
The rights to the A&W brand (except in Canada) are owned by Keurig Dr Pepper, which in turn licenses the brand to the U.S.-based A&W Restaurant chain. A&W Root Beer products are distributed via various U.S. bottlers. A&W Food Services of Canada, which is independent of both Keurig Dr Pepper and the U.S. restaurant chain, is responsible for the restaurants and marketing of root beer products in Canada, [5] with retail products bottled and distributed by the Coca-Cola Company. The U.S. variant is also sold as an import drink in Southeast Asia and Italy (where A&W has restaurants), as well as in Australia, Chile, and other countries.
Roy W. Allen opened a roadside root beer stand in Lodi, California in 1919, using a formula that he had purchased from a pharmacist. [6] He soon opened stands in Stockton, as well as five stands in nearby Sacramento - where "tray boys" pioneered drive-in curbside service. In 1920 Allen partnered with Frank Wright, birthing the A&W brand name. [7]
Allen bought Wright out, obtained a trademark, and began selling restaurant franchises - creating one of the first restaurant chains in the United States. Franchise owners could use the A&W name and logo and purchased concentrated root beer syrup from Allen. There was no common menu, architecture, or set of procedures, and some chose to also sell food. By 1933 there were 170 A&W franchises. [6]
Franchises struggled with labor shortages and sugar rationing during World War II, but following the war GI loans helped, in part, the number of A&W outlets to triple. The proliferation of the automobile and the mobility it offered resulted in more than 450 A&W Root Beer stands operating by 1950. That year Allen retired and sold the business to Nebraskan Gene Hurtz, who formed the A&W Root Beer Company. The first A&W Root Beer outlet in Canada opened in 1956.
By 1960 the number of A&W restaurants swelled to more than 2,000.
In 1963 the company was sold to the J. Hungerford Smith Company, which had produced Allen's concentrate since 1921. That year the first overseas A&W restaurant opened its doors in Guam. In 1966 Hungerford was sold to the United Fruit Company, which merged with AMK Corporation in 1970 to form the United Brands Company. [8]
In 1971 United Brands formed a wholly owned subsidiary, A&W Distributing Co., to retail its root beer. After test runs in Arizona and California the products were distributed nationally, including sugar-free, low-sodium, and caffeine-free versions. In 1974, A&W introduced "The Great Root Bear," a mascot that served as a goodwill ambassador for the brand.
In the late 1970s A&W Restaurants was formed to manage restaurant franchising. It was bought in 1982 by A. Alfred Taubman.
The bear and its associated jingle became the basis of a long-running Canadian advertising campaign. The mascot was so successful that it was eventually adopted by the American A&W chain as well.
In 1986 A&W Cream Soda and A&W Diet Cream Soda were introduced and distributed nationally, followed in 1987 by the reformulation of A&W Sugar-Free as Diet A&W.
In October 1993 A&W Beverages was folded into Cadbury Beverages. It spun off its U.S. beverages business as Dr Pepper Snapple Group in 2008.
In July 2017 A&W Canada reformulated its root beer, dropping high fructose corn syrup and some flavors from the recipe, substituting cane sugar, sarsaparilla root, licorice, birch bark and anise.[ clarification needed ] A&W Canada launched the new formula by declaring Free Root Beer Day, serving free root beer at all locations on July 22, 2017. [9]
In November 2020 Diet A&W was rebranded as A&W Zero Sugar. [10]
The Great Root Bear, also called Rooty, became the mascot for A&W Root Beer in 1973. [13]
In a long-running television advertising campaign for the Canadian A&W chain, his theme was a tuba-driven jingle entitled "Ba-Dum, Ba-Dum". The jingle was released as a single by Attic Records in Canada. It was credited to "Major Ursus", a play on the constellation name Ursa Major, which means "great bear". The famous Canadian composer and B.C. Hall of Fame enshrinee Robert Buckley helped compose the song.
In late 2011, the new ownership of A&W began using the mascot again, particularly in A&W's online presence. [14]
Shortly after Allen bought out Wright's portion of the business he began franchising the product. His profits came from a small franchise fee and sales of concentrate. There was no standard food menu for franchises until 1978. By 1960 the company had 2,000 stores.
In 1989 A&W made an agreement with Minnesota-based chain Carousel Snack Bars to convert that chain's 200 locations (mostly kiosks in shopping malls) to "A&W Hot Dogs & More". [15] [16] Some A&W Hot Dogs & More locations are in operation today.
Many A&W locations that opened in the U.S. during the Yum! Brands ownership years (2002–2011) were co-branded with Yum!'s other chains—Long John Silver's, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut or KFC.
As of December 2011 A&W was under new ownership and its world headquarters was moved back to Lexington, Kentucky. Since then, in the United States and Southeast Asia, A&W has been a franchisee-owned company. [17] [ clarification needed ]
7 Up or Seven Up is an American brand of lemon-lime–flavored non-caffeinated soft drink. The brand and formula are owned by Keurig Dr Pepper, although the beverage is internationally distributed by PepsiCo except the UK where it is distributed by Britvic, PepsiCo's designated UK distributor.
RC Cola is a cola-flavored carbonated beverage owned in the United States by Keurig Dr Pepper and internationally by RC Global Beverages, Inc.
Root beer is a sweet North American soft drink traditionally made using the root bark of the sassafras tree Sassafras albidum or the vine of Smilax ornata as the primary flavor. Root beer is typically, but not exclusively, non-alcoholic, caffeine-free, sweet, and carbonated. Like cola, it usually has a thick and foamy head. A common use is to add vanilla ice cream to make a root beer float.
A&W Restaurants, Inc. is an American fast food restaurant chain distinguished by its "Burger Family" combos, draft root beer and root beer floats. The oldest extant restaurant chain in the United States, A&W's origins date back to 1919 when Roy W. Allen set up a roadside drink stand to offer a new thick and creamy drink, root beer, at a parade honoring returning World War I veterans in Lodi, California. Allen's employee Frank Wright partnered with him in 1922 and they founded their first restaurant in Sacramento, California, in 1923. The company name was taken from the initials of their last names – Allen and Wright. The company became famous in the United States for its "frosty mugs" – the mugs were kept in a freezer and filled with A&W Root Beer just before being served to customers.
Barq's is an American brand of root beer created by Edward Barq and bottled since the beginning of the 20th century. It is owned by the Coca-Cola Company. It was known as "Barq's Famous Olde Tyme Root Beer" until 2012. Some of its formulations contain caffeine.
Crush is a brand of carbonated soft drinks owned and marketed internationally by Keurig Dr Pepper, originally created as an orange soda, Orange Crush. Crush competes with Coca-Cola's Fanta. It was created in 1911 by beverage and extract chemist Neil C. Ward. Most flavors of Crush are caffeine-free.
Mug Root Beer is an American brand of root beer that was originally produced in 1940 under the name Belfast Root Beer. It is now made by New Century Beverage Company of San Francisco, California, which was acquired by PepsiCo in 1986.
Canada Dry is a Canadian-American brand of soft drinks founded in Toronto, Ontario, in 1904, and owned since 2008 by the American company Dr Pepper Snapple. For over 100 years, Canada Dry has been known mainly for its ginger ale, though the company also manufactures a number of other soft drinks and mixers. Although it originated in Canada, Canada Dry is now produced in many countries such as the United States, Panama, Mexico, Chile, Costa Rica, Japan, Turkey and in a number of countries of Europe and the Middle East.
Vernors is an American brand of ginger ale owned by Keurig Dr Pepper that was first served in 1866 by James Vernor, a pharmacist from Detroit.
IBC Root Beer is an American brand of root beer now owned by Keurig Dr Pepper. It was originally owned by IBC until it went out of business.
Hires Root Beer was an American brand of root beer that was manufactured by Keurig Dr Pepper. Introduced in 1876, it was one of the longest continuously made soft drinks in the United States.
A&W Cream Soda is a cream soda carbonated soft drink introduced by A&W Root Beer in 1986.
An ice cream float or ice cream soda, also known as a spider in Australia and New Zealand, is a chilled beverage that consists of ice cream in either a soft drink or a mixture of flavored syrup and carbonated water.
The Great Root Bear, known since at least early 2012 as Rooty and in Quebec as Grand Ours A&W, is an anthropomorphic brown bear used as the mascot of both A&W Restaurants in the USA and its operations in Asia, while the Canadian operations use its own version. The mascot was introduced to the public in 1973. The mascot went out of use in the USA in the 2000s but saw a resurge after 2011.
Big Red is a soft drink. It was created in 1937 by Grover C Thomsen and R.H. Roark in Waco, Texas and originally known as Sun Tang Red Cream Soda. It is an American variety of cream soda and a special off-brand "blue cream soda". Gary Smith was the chief executive officer of Big Red Group (“BRG”) directly responsible for all functional areas. He successfully acquired and integrated numerous businesses to build BRG into a national company, eventually selling the entire business to Keurig Dr Pepper.
Polar Beverages is a soft drink company based in Worcester, Massachusetts. It is a manufacturer and distributor of sparkling fruit beverages, seltzer, ginger ale, drink mixers, and spring water to customers in the United States. It is the largest independent soft-drink bottler in the United States.
Keurig Dr Pepper Inc., formerly Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (1981–2014) and Keurig Green Mountain (2014–2018), is a publicly traded American beverage and coffeemaker conglomerate with headquarters in Burlington, Massachusetts, and Frisco, Texas. Formed in July 2018, with the merger of Keurig Green Mountain and Dr Pepper Snapple Group, Keurig Dr Pepper offers over 125 hot and cold beverages. The company's Canadian business unit subsidiary operates as Keurig Dr Pepper Canada.
Dr Pepper is a carbonated soft drink. It was created in the 1880s by pharmacist Charles Alderton in Waco, Texas, and first served around 1885. Dr Pepper was first nationally marketed in the United States in 1904. It is now also sold in Europe, Asia, North and South America. In Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, Dr Pepper is sold as an imported good. Variants include Diet Dr Pepper and, beginning in the 2000s, a line of additional flavors.