SunnyD (named Sunny Delight prior to circa 2000) is an

orange drink The term orange drink refers to a sweet, sugary, sometimes carbonated, orange-flavored drink. Typically such beverages contain little or no orange juice and are mainly composed of water, sugar or sweeteners, flavor, coloring, and additives, som ...

developed in 1963 by Doric Foods of Mount Dora, Florida, United States. Additional plants were built in

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

and

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

in 1974 and 1978, respectively. In April 1983, Sundor Brands bought out Doric Foods; Sundor Brands was then purchased by American multinational

Procter & Gamble The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) is an American multinational consumer goods corporation headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, founded in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble. It specializes in a wide range of personal health/consumer hea ...

in March 1989. The drink is superficially related to

orange juice Orange juice is a liquid extract of the orange (fruit), orange tree fruit, produced by squeezing or reaming oranges. It comes in several different varieties, including blood orange, navel oranges, valencia orange, clementine, and tangerine. A ...

, but also resembles a

soft drink A soft drink (see § Terminology for other names) is a drink that usually contains water (often carbonated), a sweetener, and a natural and/or artificial flavoring. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a su ...

without

carbonation Carbonation is the chemical reaction of carbon dioxide to give carbonates, bicarbonates, and carbonic acid. In chemistry, the term is sometimes used in place of carboxylation, which refers to the formation of carboxylic acids. In inorganic ch ...

. The drink produced an estimated $450 million in revenue for Procter & Gamble in 2004. In 2005, Sunny Delight was spun off into the independent Sunny Delight Beverages Company (SDBC). The beverage is also distributed by

Dr Pepper/Seven Up Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc. (DPSU, or Dr Pepper 7UP, Inc.) was a Plano, Texas-based soft-drink manufacturing company created by the merger of Dr Pepper, Inc. and The 7 Up Company on May 19, 1986. The merger was a result of the independent bailout ...

(DPSU). In

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

, the drink is manufactured and distributed by Saputo. The beverage was launched in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

in April 1998 with a £10 million promotional campaign, and by August 1999, it became the third biggest selling drink in the United Kingdom, behind

Coca-Cola Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a carbonated soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. Originally marketed as a temperance drink and intended as a patent medicine, it was invented in the late 19th century by John Stith Pemberton in Atlanta ...

and

Pepsi Pepsi is a carbonated soft drink manufactured by PepsiCo. Originally created and developed in 1893 by Caleb Bradham and introduced as Brad's Drink, it was renamed as Pepsi-Cola in 1898, and then shortened to Pepsi in 1961. History Pepsi was ...

. It was sold in refrigerated cabinets, and marketed as a healthier alternative to

soft drinks A soft drink (see § Terminology for other names) is a drink that usually contains water (often carbonated), a sweetener, and a natural and/or artificial flavoring. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a s ...

despite neither being healthier nor requiring refrigeration. Despite the name, SunnyD is not a high source of

vitamin D Vitamin D is a group of fat-soluble secosteroids responsible for increasing intestinal absorption of calcium, magnesium, and phosphate, and many other biological effects. In humans, the most important compounds in this group are vitamin D3 (c ...

, nor has it ever claimed to be; however, it contains significant amounts of

vitamin C Vitamin C (also known as ascorbic acid and ascorbate) is a water-soluble vitamin found in citrus and other fruits and vegetables, also sold as a dietary supplement and as a topical 'serum' ingredient to treat melasma (dark pigment spots) an ...

. SunnyD started out with only one flavor:

orange Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower *Orange (colour), from the color of an orange, occurs between red and yellow in the visible spectrum * ...

. Now it comes in multiple flavors: Tangy Original, Smooth Orange, Orange Strawberry, Orange Mango, Orange Peach, Watermelon, Fruit Punch, Peach, Mango, Blue Raspberry, Cherry Limeade, Lemonade, and Orange Pineapple.

Ingredients

*Water *

High fructose corn syrup High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), also known as glucose–fructose, isoglucose and glucose–fructose syrup, is a sweetener made from corn starch. As in the production of conventional corn syrup, the starch is broken down into glucose by enzym ...

* 2% or less of the following: **

Citric acid Citric acid is an organic compound with the chemical formula HOC(CO2H)(CH2CO2H)2. It is a colorless weak organic acid. It occurs naturally in citrus fruits. In biochemistry, it is an intermediate in the citric acid cycle, which occurs in t ...

Ascorbic acid Vitamin C (also known as ascorbic acid and ascorbate) is a water-soluble vitamin found in citrus and other fruits and vegetables, also sold as a dietary supplement and as a topical 'serum' ingredient to treat melasma (dark pigment spots) an ...

Thiamin hydrochloride Thiamine, also known as thiamin and vitamin B1, is a vitamin, an essential micronutrient, that cannot be made in the body. It is found in food and commercially synthesized to be a dietary supplement or medication. Phosphorylated forms of thi ...

Natural flavors A flavoring (or flavouring), also known as flavor (or flavour) or flavorant, is a food additive used to improve the taste or smell of food. It changes the perceptual impression of food as determined primarily by the chemoreceptors of the gustat ...

Modified cornstarch Modified starch, also called starch derivatives, are prepared by physically, enzymatically, or chemically treating native starch to change its properties. Modified starches are used in practically all starch applications, such as in food produ ...

Canola oil Close-up of canola blooms Canola flower Rapeseed oil is one of the oldest known vegetable oils. There are both edible and industrial forms produced from rapeseed, the seed of several cultivars of the plant family Brassicaceae. Historically, i ...

Sodium citrate Sodium citrate may refer to any of the sodium salts of citric acid (though most commonly the third): * Monosodium citrate * Disodium citrate * Trisodium citrate The three forms of salt are collectively known by the E number E331. Applications F ...

Cellulose gum Carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) or cellulose gum is a cellulose derivative with carboxymethyl groups (-CH2-COOH) bound to some of the hydroxyl groups of the glucopyranose monomers that make up the cellulose backbone. It is often used as its sodiu ...

Sucralose Sucralose is an artificial sweetener and sugar substitute. The majority of ingested sucralose is not broken down by the body, so it is noncaloric. In the European Union, it is also known under the E number E955. It is produced by chlorination of ...

** Acesulfame potassium **

Neotame Neotame, also known by the trade name Newtame, is a non-caloric artificial sweetener and aspartame analog by NutraSweet. By mass, it is 8000 times sweeter than sucrose. It has no notable off-flavors when compared to sucrose. It enhances origina ...

Sodium hexametaphosphate Sodium hexametaphosphate (SHMP) is a salt of composition Na6 PO3)6 Sodium hexametaphosphate of commerce is typically a mixture of metaphosphates (empirical formula: NaPO3), of which the hexamer is one, and is usually the compound referred to by t ...

Potassium sorbate Potassium sorbate is the potassium salt of sorbic acid, chemical formula CH3CH=CH−CH=CH−CO2K. It is a white salt that is very soluble in water (58.2% at 20 °C). It is primarily used as a food preservative (E number 202). Potassium sor ...

** Yellow #5 ** Yellow #6 ** Concentrated juices: *** Orange *** Tangerine *** Apple *** Lime *** Grapefruit *** Pear ** Red #33 ** Red #40

Promotional campaigns

Reach for the Sun Bottle Hunt

In the middle of the 1990s, Sunny Delight sponsored an early internet contest promoting their beverage. For the game, the "Reach for the Sun Bottle Hunt", simple graphics depicting Sunny Delight bottles were incorporated into independent American web sites. The site locations were various personal home pages or more well known internet resources. At the main contest site, riddles were provided weekly to help people discover each of the sites displaying a hidden bottle. Participants were encouraged to use the newest search engines in combination with the riddles. Initially appearing in 1996 and gaining widespread attention, the contest was repeated three times over the course of a year and a half, and over 4,000 prizes were awarded during each iteration, ranging from T-shirts to college scholarships. As a pioneering internet advertising meme, it set the stage for years of later web marketing promotions.

Peel 'n Taste Flavor Strips

In July 2009, to promote the company's Sunny Delight Smoothies, the company partnered with

Food Lion Food Lion is an American regional grocery store chain headquartered in Salisbury, North Carolina, that operates over 1100 supermarkets in 10 states of the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern United States (Delaware, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, North ...

supermarkets to place SunnyD Smoothies Peel 'n Taste flavor samplers in the aisles where Sunny Delight products were located.

Reformulation

In recent years, the

artificial sweetener A sugar substitute is a food additive that provides a sweetness like that of sugar while containing significantly less food energy than sugar-based sweeteners, making it a zero-calorie () or low-calorie sweetener. Artificial sweeteners may be d ...

sucralose Sucralose is an artificial sweetener and sugar substitute. The majority of ingested sucralose is not broken down by the body, so it is noncaloric. In the European Union, it is also known under the E number E955. It is produced by chlorination of ...

has been added in combination with high fructose corn syrup, in order to cut the calorie count. As of 2022, North American Sunny Delight contains 2% or less concentrated fruit juice.

Controversies

In the United Kingdom, there were many negative press reports about the product, following an investigation by

The Food Commission The Food Commission is an independent food Watchdog journalism, watchdog campaigning for safer, Human nutrition, healthier food in the United Kingdom, UK. The commission is primarily funded by public subscriptions to their campaign journal, the '' ...

, an independent consumer organisation in the United Kingdom. In December 1999, according to a report by

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...

, the negative publicity escalated when a Sunny Delight television commercial showing a snowman turning orange was released, at about the same time as reports of a four-year-old girl who experienced her skin turning orange – due to the product's use of beta-Carotene for color – after drinking an estimated 1.5 liters of Sunny Delight a day. Sales had halved by 2001, and the drink was redesigned and reinvented in March 2003 as "SunnyD". In the United Kingdom, SunnyD was relaunched in March 2009, with a new formulation containing 70% fruit juice and no artificial ingredients or added sugar. However, amid declining sales, the product was further reformulated in April 2010, as a lower priced beverage containing only 15% fruit juice. The brand's

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

account is known for its odd tweets; one particular tweet, saying "I can't do this anymore" created unparalleled engagement from other brands, but has received criticism for trivializing and monetizing

mental illness A mental disorder, also referred to as a mental illness or psychiatric disorder, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. Such features may be persistent, relapsing and remitti ...

References

{{Reflist, 2

External links

Official site

Official UK site

Official Spanish site

A profile at BBC News
Former Procter & Gamble brands Juice brands Products introduced in 1963