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WINES & BEVERAGES


How Steap Green Tea Soda Became a Hit
By Ellen Walsh

Basically, Steap Green Tea Soda is a lightly carbonated green tea soda, with natural and organic flavors and ingredients. Sounds simple. However reinventing soda to make it nutritious and organic took over a 2 year period of time in the R & D stage, with over 50 versions in all before settling in on the current flavor profile.

Because sodas are such a world wide commodity, it was important to "kill a lot of birds with one stone" in order to get picked up by main stream grocery and health food stores. The taste had to be perfect. The overall goal was to take the every day soda flavors already accepted by the masses, and re engineer them to be healthy, and taste good.

Click on Images for Captions

"We finally settled in on organic Ceylon green tea," says co- founder Eric Schnell." It is the one of the finest green teas in the world, and it's mild flavor worked well with the formulas."

Schnell, who previously ran an organic tea company, sits with partner Steven Kessler, former President of an international bottled water company, as they explain how they decided to come together to create a green tea soda to introduce to the masses. They were creating the first organic soda to carry the new USDA Organic Seal, and they were creating the first "tea soda", so their strategy, as well as their product, had to be perfect.

A key factor to their success, is that the soda is brewed in a 100 year old microbrewery, the old fashioned way. Needing a place that could pasteurize by heat, and was willing to go under QAI certification in order to meet current NOSB (National Organic Standards Bureau) standards, the team struck a deal with The Lion Brewery, which is nestled away in the Pocono Mountains in Northern Pennsylvania. Eager to be part of the organic movement, The Lion Brewery converted their entire facility to create the protocols needed to produce organic beverages.

Every Ingredient is Healthy

One of the best parts about the green tea soda, is that it is heat pasteurized naturally, at 210 degrees, so there are no artificial preservatives needed, like most other soda brands. This fact alone is enough to change the entire health profile of the beverage, however care is taken to make sure that every ingredient offers some benefit to the human body.

Organic Cane Juice is the Sweetener

Nature's purest sweetener, it is harvested by pressing the sugar cane, and then steaming it until it is a pure golden liquid. As it still contains its own dietary fiber and calcium, it's nutritive value is absorbed by the body and processed as a food.

Striving for a cross marketed hit that could someday lead to the vision of a "green tea soda in every household", great care was taken in the appearance of the soda, while still adhering to the organic standards. The raspberry color comes from the hibiscus flower. The orange color comes from a blend of purple cabbage juice and blended with beta carotene. The key lime and lemon dew flavors have no color added at all, as they are the color of the green tea itself. The lime flavoring, from real limes, is an extract of the lime oil from the skin of the limes. Everything has to be healthier. Sodium citrate is added to the formulas to help keep the tea solids and compounds in solution longer and help keep the products health benefits consistent over the product's shelf life.

The soda is available nationally in over 3,000 stores today, including Safeway, Kroger, Wild Oats, Whole Foods, and many more. Eric and Steve have been successful in getting the majors to pick up this new category, due in part to an aggressive grass roots sampling campaign. "Every time someone tastes the soda, they want to buy it", says Schnell. "That's a lot of incentive to be out there night and day, making sure that people get to try it."

For more information on how you can order or stock this product,
Contact The Healthy Beverage Co. at 800-295-1388 or visit their website at HYPERLINK http://www.healthybeverage.com/

Other Great Links:
Steaz Green Tea Soda Ad


 

 

 

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