Sprite (soft drink) Sprite (soft drink) Sprite is a colorless, caffeine-free, lemon and lime-flavored soft drink created by The Coca-Cola Company. It was first developed in West Germany in 1959 as Fanta Klare Zitrone (“Clear Lemon Fanta”) and was introduced in the United States under the current brand name Sprite in 1961 as a competitor to 7 Up. Bottles of Sprite are usually transparent green in color, with a green and yellow label, whereas cans are colored silver, green, and blue, and aluminum bottles have a solid lime green color. Sprite advertising often makes use of the portmanteau word "lymon", a combination of
7 Up short time in 1988 as a spice-flavored beverage, similar to Vernor's Ginger Ale. Though 7 Up's marketing slogan at that time was "Never Had It, Never Will" (referring to caffeine), 7 Up Gold included caffeine as an ingredient. It was introduced by 7 Up in the hopes of capturing 1% of the cola market, which at the time was $26.6 billion. However, it only captured 0.1% of the market because people were confused by 7 Up marketing a dark-colored soft drink with caffeine, so it was discontinued. The 7 Up Gold recipe was actually an unused Dr Pepper invention. 7