{"id":22900,"date":"2020-11-23T23:02:45","date_gmt":"2020-11-23T23:02:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=22900"},"modified":"2020-11-24T08:05:26","modified_gmt":"2020-11-24T08:05:26","slug":"the-rise-and-fall-of-tab-after-surviving-the-sweetener-scares-the-iconic-diet-soda-gets-canned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/the-rise-and-fall-of-tab-after-surviving-the-sweetener-scares-the-iconic-diet-soda-gets-canned\/","title":{"rendered":"The rise and fall of Tab \u2013 after surviving the sweetener scares, the iconic diet soda gets canned"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jeffrey Miller<\/a>, Colorado State University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Tab, the Coca-Cola company\u2019s original diet soda brand, is headed to the soda graveyard, joining retired brands such as Like<\/a>, Leed<\/a> and Limette<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Coca-Cola has announced that it is discontinuing Tab after 57 years on the market<\/a>, and fans of the drink will have until the end of December to purchase their last can of nostalgia.<\/p>\n

From the beginning, Tab\u2019s story has been one of perseverance. The brand survived initial low sales, the artificial sweetener scares of the 1960s and 1970s, lukewarm enthusiasm for the product at the corporate level and intermittent consumer availability to become \u2013 for a brief period \u2013 the most popular diet soda in America. Then, of course, Diet Coke came along.<\/p>\n

While it never regained its lofty status as the top diet soda, loyal Tab fans kept the brand alive.<\/p>\n

Meant for diabetics, downed by dieters<\/h2>\n

While some might think Tab was the first diet soda, that honor actually belongs to a beverage called No-Cal<\/a>, which was developed by beverage industry pioneer Hyman Kirsch in 1952. Kirsch wanted to create a soda for diabetics and people with cardiovascular problems, so he used cyclamate<\/a>, which was discovered in 1937 by a graduate student working at a University of Illinois chemistry lab after he licked some of the substance and found that it tasted sweet. About 30 times sweeter than sugar, cyclamate isn\u2019t metabolized, making it ideal for people who need to avoid sugar.<\/p>\n

But from the start, No-Cal was popular with a different type of consumer: dieters. Actress Kim Novak became the brand\u2019s slim celebrity spokesperson<\/a>. Canada Dry followed soon after with a line of diet sodas called Glamor, marketing it to women trying to lose weight<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Diet soda really took off with the introduction of Diet-Rite Cola<\/a> by the Royal Crown Cola company in 1958. Like No-Cal, Diet-Rite initially targeted diabetics and was often placed in the over-the-counter medicine section of grocers. But it soon became clear that the real market was dieters. By 1960, Diet-Rite was the fourth-best-selling soft drink in the country<\/a>, trailing only Coca-Cola, Pepsi and 7 Up.<\/p>\n

Soda giants caught flat-footed<\/h2>\n

Coca-Cola and Pepsi, finding themselves behind the ball, scrambled to come up with their own diet soda offerings.<\/p>\n

Coca-Cola\u2019s foray into the diet cola market \u2013 dubbed Project Alpha<\/a> \u2013 was an ambitious one. It wanted to come up with a soda that tasted good, had a proper mouthfeel \u2013 sugar adds not only sweetness but also viscosity<\/a> \u2013 and was attractive to women, the presumptive market. It also needed a catchy name.<\/p>\n

For the name, Coke executives had one directive: Even though its taste was engineered to mimic Coke\u2019s, it couldn\u2019t be called Diet Coke. Because most early diet sodas didn\u2019t taste that great, strategists warned<\/a> against associating their brands with drinks that might taint their tremendous value.<\/p>\n

So an early IBM mainframe computer generated more than 600 candidates<\/a> with the parameters that the name be three or four letters and not offensive in any foreign language.<\/p>\n

Tabb, which was eventually shortened to Tab, eventually won the battle of market testing. Stylized as \u201cTaB,\u201d it was introduced to the world in a series of ads<\/a> with the tagline \u201cHow can just one calorie taste so good?\u201d<\/p>\n

For a company that ordinarily has such excellent marketing instincts, Coca-Cola wasn\u2019t sure how to fit Tab into its portfolio. Bottlers resisted the product, fearing it would undercut their profitable sugar-based sodas. By the end of its first year, it had only 10% of the diet soda market<\/a>, an unusual predicament for a brand backed by the No. 1 soda company in the world.<\/p>\n