Zingerade Spicy Lemonade

Do you want to start your own bottled drink company, but you're worried that the market is saturated? There are tons of teas, tonics, sodas, sport drinks, colas, waters, ales, punches, potions, and elixirs out there on the market. Where could you possibly fit in? What kind of market share could you possibly hope to dig out of that mountain of refreshment?

You have your heart set on starting your own drink company don't you? Don't you? Yes you do. Yes you do. Don't you?

Lucky for you, you know me, and I can tell you a drink that no one is bottling, no one is marketing, no one is selling, and yet hundreds of thousands of people are drinking. What is it?

The master cleanse lemonade, made from lemons, maple syrup, cayenne pepper, and of course, water. If anyone is selling this pre-made, I can't find it. I would brand it "Zingerade." Zingerade.com is available, it sounds cool, and conveys the general vibe of the product. It is slightly cliche, but so was Powerade, and that was put out by CocaCola. Give me a couple of million bucks and I will come up with a better name (that is an offer for CocaCola too).

I know what you are thinking. You are thinking that the master cleanse lemonade sounds really gross. Well, it is actually pretty good. I have never been on the master cleanse, but for some reason every woman that I know tries to do it at least three times a year. Most of the time they fail, but I have had many chances to taste the spicy lemonade, and I like to take chances. It has a definite zing and a taste that just keeps giving. A unique flavor is hard to find, but this is one that is sitting right there giving you the finger.

Even if it tasted like total crap, it has medicinal properties. We all know that if you tell people something is good for them, it can taste like poop mixed with tartar sauce, and they will still drink it or eat it. Cayenne pepper quells hunger and boosts your metabolism. You don't have to be on a seven day fast to want to drink something that will stop you from eating seven twinkies between lunch and dinner while helping you burn more calories.

The convenience of this drink would attract anyone doing the master cleanse, and though it might sound crazy, there are tons of people out there not on the master cleanse or trying to lose weight who would drink Zingerade. People who smoke or drink heavily crave spicy foods because their taste buds have been killed off (I know all you drinkers are already thinking about what this would taste like mixed with vodka). Why do you think Bloody Marys are so popular?

Even if you hate the product just think of the marketing campaigns.

"Spice up your lemonade! Spice up your life! Zingerade!"

"Zingerade! The Juice with real Juice!"

"Jump-Start Your Lemonade! Zingerade!"

"Drink Zingerade or DIE FAT AND ALONE!"

You don't have to be a genius to see that this has some real potential. Make this idea happen. Make some money. Make your bed. Make out a check to me for two million dollars.
P.S. You really should subscribe to Ideas By Chuck. If you don't who will?

P.P.S. Zingerade and vodka is great.

P.P.P.S. If I can follow a chair that reports every time someone farts on it, you can follow me. Click here.

Select-A-Soda...JERK!

For any of you out there who aren't familiar with some of the basic history behind soft drinks, let me give you a little crash course.

Back in the day, soft drinks, sodas, pop, etc. started off as medicines, or a way of delivering medicine. Syrups, sugars, and carbonated water were used to disguise the bitter tastes of the medicines, many narcotic and opiate based. Coke isn't called coke for nothing. Alka-Seltzer is kind of a throwback to the old school.

There were no canned or bottled drinks at first. Each soda was hand mixed by a pharmacist, and then when these drinks became more popular for their tastes than for their medicinal powers, soda jerks, teen boys with acne and funny hats, would make customers drinks, basically like a bar.

When companies like Coca Cola and Pepsi started, they were just producing and selling the syrup flavoring. Eventually they started mixing and bottling the drinks themselves, but to this day, a majority of their profits come from the sale of the syrup flavoring separate to restaurants and gas stations etc. where the modern day soda fountains abound. You have seen these, and most of us know how to use them now due to the fact that a huge percentage of the population has worked at McDonald's or some other fast food place, and they are so simple that a chicken with a broken leg could probably use one.

Of course, I have left some things out, but I am sure that there are books or something somewhere that you can get more info from, but
that is not why I am here.

Back to the soda fountains, they basically work like an automated soda jerk, kid with acne and a funny hat. They take the syrup flavoring and mix it with carbonated water in the right ratio to give you a tasty beverage.

But, because of differences in machines, water quality, settings, dirty pipes, a guy named Murder Clown and his soda fetish, or whatever, drinks don't always taste exactly the same from fountain to fountain. Moreover, these fountain drinks also taste different from the bottled versions. It's true, you can ask my friend's mom Nancy. She only gets her Diet Pepsi from Taco Bells.

Fine, I know you are sick of reading this crap, so here is the idea: A soda fountain that allows you to vary the amount of syrup in your soda - at least 3-4 choices of how sweet you want your drink.

Plenty of people in this country are already diabetics, why not let us decide how sweet we want our soda?

I wasn't there, but I would assume that back in the day, when ugly, loser, teen boys with bad acne were serving up drinks, I would assume that you could have told these ugly losers to make your drink the way you wanted it. After all, they were essentially really ugly, horribly deformed by acne, bartenders. Bring that back, but without the acne.

Most fast food places make you get your own drink anyway, why not have some more power over it?

Do this. Make this happen. There are advantages all around.

Fast food restaurants will love this. Their highest profit margins come off of the sales of soft drinks. Imagine how happy they will be if they can sell soft drinks for the same price, made with less syrup. Maybe less people will develop type two diabetes, and soft drink companies can use this angle as a PR boost. Plus, the carbonic acid is really what eats away at your teeth, not the sugar, so dentists won't care. It won't affect them one bit.

P.S. I have heard that a blind man subscribed to IdeasByChuck.com, but I wasn't there to see it.

P.P.S. This post is dedicated to all those poor, horribly deformed, bastards...the soda jerks. God bless em.