User:Rainbowsisi

History
Snapple was founded by Leonard Marsh, Hyman Golden, and Arnold Greenberg in 1972 Valley Stream, Long Island, New York.[1] Their company, which was originally known as Unadulterated Food Products, was first conceived as a part-time venture to supply fruit juices to health food stores.[2] Unsure if the business would succeed, Greenberg continued to run his health food store in Manhattan's East Village, while Leonard Marsh and his brother-in-law, Hyman Golden, operated a window washing business.[2] In a 1989 interview with Crain's New York Business, Marsh admitted that when they launched the small business he knew "as much about juice as about making an atom bomb."[2]

An early apple juice product led to the company's name, Snapple.[2] Golden, Greenberg and Marsh had created a carbonated apple juice.[2] One of the batches of apple juice fermented in the bottle, causing the bottle caps to fly off.[2] The original name of that particular apple juice product, "Snapple," a portmanteau derived from the words "snappy" and "apple," became the new name for their beverage company while attending Lawrence High School. Robin Greenberg had invited her boyfriend Richard Connolly to come over to her modest Valley Stream home, to help come up with a name for the new beverage her father was starting. At the table was Robin, her brother and Arnold her father. Robin's brother was snapping his fingers saying we want it to be a snappy name, Richard asked Arnold "what's it going to taste like" Arnold replied "like Ocean Spray's Cranapple", (which was perhaps the only popular non-carbonated drink at the time") Richard replied "if you leave "apple" in the name it will be successful, as an apple a day keeps the doctor away". Hence the name Snap+apple.

The Snapple Beverage Corporation was born, beginning in the early 1980s.[2][3] Snapple would not manufacture their first tea, lemon tea, until 1987.[4]

Currently, there are many different types of Snapple: Tea ( Multiple flavors along with original and diet), juice drinks, lemonade, and bottled water. Snapple is also bottled in the form of an aluminum can.[5]

Snapple's brand slogan is "Made from the Best Stuff on Earth."

Snapple was known for a popular series of TV advertisements in the early 1990s featuring Wendy Kaufman (the "Snapple Lady") answering letters from Snapple fans.[6] In an effort to counteract the Coke and Pepsi challenge commercials, Snapple began running a new line of advertisements in May 1992, which featured its trademark “made from the best stuff on earth” line in ads that spoofed earlier beer and sports drinks promotions; the ads received low marks from advertising industry observers. In addition, the company used its $15-million-a-year advertising budget to pay for a long-lived series of live radio commercials featuring controversial disk jockeys Howard Stern and Rush Limbaugh. At the end of the summer of 1992, Snapple conducted a five-week search for a new advertising agency that could better convey its corporate identity in preparation for a wider national push. Later that year, Snapple also signed tennis player Jennifer Capriati to endorse its products. By August 1992, Snapple had expanded its distribution to every major city in the United States and it signed new contracts with beverage distributors. The company owned no manufacturing facilities, but instead made agreements with more than 30 bottlers across the country. In this way, Snapple was able to keep its overhead low and its payroll short. The company administration consisted of just 80 employees, 50 of whom worked out of a modest office building on Long Island.[7]

Thomas H. Lee, an American businessperson, financier and investor of Thomas H. Lee Partners (THL) acquired Snapple Beverages in 1992 on undisclosed terms. The three founders of Snapple, Leonard Marsh, Hyman Golden and Arnold Greenberg, said they would own about one-third of the new company and be involved in its management. Hellen Berry, vice president of the Beverage Marketing Corporation, a consultant in New York, estimated that Snapple, which had been for sale for more than a year and had $100 million in sales in 1991, sold for $140 million.Only eight months after buying the company, Lee took Snapple Beverages public and in 1994, only two years after the original acquisition, Lee sold the company to Quaker Oats for $1.7 billion. Lee was estimated to have made $900 million for himself and his investors from the sale. The Quaker Oats Company bought Snapple for $1.7 billion in 1994.[8] The company ran into problems and sold it to Triarc in 1997 for $300 million.[9] Triarc sold it to Cadbury Schweppes for $1.45 billion in September 2000.[10] It was spun off in May 2008 to its current owners.

Starting in May 2009, Snapple was made with sugar, not high fructose corn syrup. However, in certain areas, the older formula is still sold in stores, but this is becoming increasingly rare.