Orbitz was a non-carbonated fruit-flavored beverage produced by The Clearly Food & Beverage Company of Canada, makers of Clearly Canadian. The drink was sold in five[1] flavors, and made with small floating edible fruit-flavored jelly beads. Orbitz was marketed as a "texturally enhanced alternative beverage" but some consumers compared it to a potable lava lamp.[2][3]
It was introduced in test markets around May 1996, then went to most markets by 1997, and then quickly disappeared due to poor sales.[citation needed]
Post-discontinuation
The product's domain name was bought by the Internet-based travel agency named Orbitz.
Unopened bottles from the drink's original launch have become a collector's item, appearing on online auction websites worth $30-$50 on online sales. The Clearly Food & Beverage Company states that the proprietary equipment that made Orbitz broke down and the trademark is no longer owned by the company.[2]
Ingredients
The small balls floated due to their nearly equal density to the surrounding liquid, and remained suspended with the assistance of gellan gum. The gellan gum provided a support matrix and had a visual clarity approaching that of water, which increased with the addition of sugar. The gellan gum created a very weak yield stress which has been measured to be ~0.04 Pa.[4]
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