After 50 years, the popular soft drink brand Lilt, known for its ‘totally tropical taste’, is being rebranded and replaced by Fanta Pineapple & Grapefruit. The Coca-Cola Company, which owns Lilt, announced the change and clarified that the drink’s taste and ingredients would remain unchanged.
The rebranding of Lilt to Fanta Pineapple & Grapefruit has generated mixed reactions from fans of the brand. Many fans took to social media to express their dismay at the change, with some saying that they will continue to call the drink Lilt. Some fans associated Lilt with memories of their youth and saw the rebranding as unnecessary.
Lilt was launched in the UK in 1975 and became a household name partly because of its advertising campaigns. One memorable television ad from the late 1980s featured the ‘Lilt Man’, a parody of a milkman, delivering Lilt in a ‘Lilt float’ on a Caribbean beach. In the 1990s, the drink was promoted with advertisements featuring two Jamaican women, Blanche Williams and Hazel Palmer, who became known in the media as the ‘Lilt Ladies’.
Some fans had already guessed that a change was coming when Lilt’s cans were redesigned last year using the Fanta font. While the rebranding of Lilt may be disappointing for some fans, the drink’s taste and ingredients will remain the same under its new name. Fans of Lilt can rest assured that they will still be able to enjoy the same ‘totally tropical taste’ that they have come to love over the years.
Fanta, which is available in over 190 countries, is already well-known for its fruity flavors, and introducing a new flavor under the Fanta brand may be more profitable than maintaining the Lilt brand separately. The new flavor is likely to be promoted heavily to existing Fanta customers and could also attract new customers who may not have tried Lilt before.
Coca-Cola has announced that it will be rebranding its popular Lilt soft drink to Fanta Pineapple & Grapefruit from February 14th. While the iconic taste of the drink remains the same, the brand change is intended to make Lilt ‘fit in’ with the Fanta family. The company has reassured its loyal fanbase that nothing has changed about the product apart from its name.
The Fanta brand manager, Charlotte Walsham, assured consumers that the ‘new name’ wouldn’t put a strain on their wallets either. Fanta Pineapple & Grapefruit bottles and cans will be gradually rolled out across the UK at the same affordable prices as before. This rebrand is a move that Coca-Cola hopes will bring a new level of excitement to the beloved soft drink while allowing its fans to remain loyal to the classic taste they know and love.
