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Looking at the ingredient list–sparkling water, citric acid, natural flavor, citrus pectin, aspartame, and a bunch of preservatives, dyes, and vitamins–it’s not hard to see why. Nothing in this stuff has ever come near any real fruit as far as I can tell. One coworker described its taste as “synthetic,” while another who’s particularly sensitive to aspartame thought it had an aftertaste of burned plastic.
Possibly the most interesting thing about Tava is that, according to the New York Times, Pepsi is marketing its new product mainly online, skipping the traditional television and print ads. But when I google “Tava,” the first three nonsponsored links that come up are a Wikipedia entry and the Transgender Americans Veterans Association Web site (twice). Then come some suggestions that maybe I meant to type “Teva,” and finally, “Also see tava pepsi.” If they’re really all about the online market, they might want to pay more attention to these things, and maybe get some Web gurus to move it up the list. It doesn’t look like its popularity is going to be moving it up anytime soon.
