Top 10 Iced Tea Brands
Origins
Ever since it was invented, iced tea has steadily gained popularity. From its early beginnings as an alcoholic punch to now, as a popular thirst quencher, iced tea has become a bigger and bigger business. A multi-billion dollar one, in fact. And the draw of billions of dollars has made hundreds of iced tea brands available. Here are the very top ten of those hundreds.
The Top Ten
1. Snapple—Now sold across America, is one of the top iced tea brands out there. Snapple has also gotten improved ratings ever since they stopped using high fructose corn syrup in their drinks. They instead use sugar. Not to mention that their little “fact caps” are pretty cool.
2. Lipton—A generally more healthy tea than most, this English tea company was founded in Scotland. Also partly owned by PepsiCo, Lipton is notable for winning the Corporate Green Globe Award from working with the Rainforest Alliance.
3. AriZona—This popular tea company has a lot of different kinds of teas, juices, and sodas. One weird fact about them, however, is that they only have high fructose corn syrup in the U.S., but in Canada they use natural sugar. You’ve got to wonder why...
4. Sweet Leaf—This is a pretty homey iced tea, especially since there is a picturesque grandma on the label. This tea is a little bit unusual in that it is one of the rapidly declining amount of tea brands that use honey as the main sweetener. It’s also this fact that makes the tea taste more original.
5. Tazo—This tea is about as natural as you can get (minus making it yourself). They use a lot of natural ingredients and sweeteners. They are also one of the few tea brands that has unsweetened tea. It’s always good to be natural.
6. SoBe—Also known as the South Beach Beverage Company, SoBe is owned by PepsiCo. SoBe is also known for making a lot of energy drinks as well, such as its now discontinued Adrenaline Rush. They are also popular for their Lifewater drinks.
7. Gold Peak—While this beverage company is owned by the ever-dominating Coca-Cola Company, they are different enough to be mentioned here. One of the company’s major accomplishments is winning the ChefsBest award for best taste. They are also one of the growing number of companies who are offering white tea as well as green and black tea.
8. Honest Tea—This company started out as being notable for the (almost) lack of sugar and other sweeteners. While that has changed somewhat with the company’s growth, they are still making headway with projects such as Honest Cities. (This involves the tea being put out in stands in major cities with payment being done using the honor system. It was a huge success.) They are also notable because they are USDA approved.
9. Nestea—This iced tea company was one of the first to widely sell their drinks in vending machines. They are currently owned by Nestle. This company actively competes with Pepsi’s Lipton Iced Tea.
10. Arnold Palmer—While this drink is not completely iced tea, it is so integrated into the business that I thought that it should be included. It is a mix of lemonade and iced tea; a mix that has become very popular. Currently it is being licensed to the AriZona Beverage Company.
From its early beginnings to now, iced tea has dominated the beverage industry, and will a hundred years from now (without a doubt with some new artificial preservatives and sweeteners). Iced tea is just one of those drinks that never dies.