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 drinks were bottled in 6-ounce bottles). Westinghouse bought 7 Up in 1969 and sold it in 1978 to Philip Morris, who then in 1986 sold it in two parts: the international division to Pepsico and the U.S. business to a group led by the investment firm Hicks & Haas. In the U.S., 7 Up merged with Dr Pepper in 1988; Cadbury Schweppes bought the combined company in 1995. The Dr Pepper Snapple Group was spun off from Cadbury Schweppes in 2008; it merged with Keurig Green Mountain in 2018 to form Keurig Dr Pepper. 7 Up has been reformulated several