I was a college freshman in 1994. Zima and Jolly Ranchers was my drink of choice. Also my roommate and I found a kitten outside of our dorm one night and she was smuggled in and of course named Zima lol. My mom took the cat in when we got caught. Zima lived a long happy life.
Coors really, really wanted Zima to be a hit because it could be made with the lowest-grade, cheapest grain, and minimal effort - normally, this would have just made for an unbelievably awful beer, but the charcoal filtering stripping everything out left it relatively neutral. Then you just re-introduce some citrus flavoring agent, and bam, you sell it for as much as regular beer, but manufactured for a significantly lower cost. This is also why alco-seltzers are getting big marketing pushes. They're the spiritual successor to Zima, made along the same lines: with super cheap ingredients for a higher profit margin.
I used to regret that I couldn't at least try zima once...until I've read your comment. Thanks. Knowing what zima actually is, I'm glad to know it only as a pop culture punchline. Imagine...if it was so popular it could replace or at least largely substitute beer. That world would be my own personal hell.
@@ThisIsSolution So is spritzer lemonade with a dash of vodka and maybe a bit of zest. At least as far as I can tell from the description, that's roughly what Zima is. You're probably wrong about the it still being sold part, though. Japan discontinued it in 2021 and the last time new stock was manufactured by Coors was in 2018. I mean technically, you can still find them in some stores, but at this point it's likely a very finite resource, at least until they make new batches again. Hopefully I can snag me a bottle somehow before the last one is drunk. So many of my favorite tv shows referenced it that at this point, I'd consider it a life not well lived if I miss out on knowing what it's like. If it's anything like American chocolate or American cheese, then at least I'll be in on the joke the next time around.
I came to post this, glad others noticed. I had no idea he was in a Zima commercial. He won’t be sharing one with CM Punk after their match this month though.
You'll notice a pattern in history, if you're clever and observant. Everything old becomes new again. That packaging would have been called Art Deco in the 1930's.
@@bigguy7353 litteraly what's happening right now, I'm 21 so I'm not super old, but already noticing little things like the art style of cartoons, and the parachute pants and loose clothing teenagers are starting to wear again, the Lauren hill inspired music, it's like the late 80s and 90s all over again and teens swear there pioneering a wave 🤣🤣🤣
@@velezpressurewashing5749 When I was a kid in the '90s, 'flare-leg' jeans were popular with girls. Same exact thing as bell bottom jeans in the '70s, lol.
I will remember Zema for the rest of my life because it was the first drink to get me somewhat drunk when I was 13-14. My parent dropped me off at the local sledding hill with my friends. In the parking lot I somehow miraculously uncovered a 6 pack of Zima that someone had buried in the snow presumably to keep cold, with 5 remaining. I smuggled them home until I had the courage to drink 3 one night. And holy moly was that a great night. Watching Futurama and getting tipsy and then playing Perfect Dark while my parents slept. Great times.
Those kinds of memories are always the best. I remember being in high school and stealing a bottle of super, super old red wine from the wine shelf in the basement. Since it had been sitting there for 20+ years, it tasted super musty and just disgusting. That didn’t stop me from drinking the whole damn thing in one afternoon then promptly vomiting the next morning. Ahhh… good times 😂
I remember my first drunk moment at 14. Drinking Molson XXX with some friends in a tent in November. The one friend brought an old kerosene tent heater that his stepdad insisted he bring. We only had 2 or 3 beers but were feeling absolutely hammered. Then we started puking and developed horrible headaches. And that was the first time we had carbon monoxide poisoning.....😂
My mom quit drinking for 15 years until Zima. She was a full blown alcoholic after one taste. Needless to say, the rest of my childhood was traumatic lol
I’m sorry for your traumatic childhood, but WHAT?? Breaking sobriety over 5% vol piss water is wild. At least go for the handle of vodka like an adult 😂
Wow do you need me to coddle you? To validate your childhood? Get over it MILLIONS of people have had the same experience and don't try to get "likes".
I was a raging alcoholic for decades. There was a period of time when my wife didn’t think zima was real beer (which I know, I know) so I drank that crap by the case. Terrible heartburn. But I was drunk.
That's funny. I used to pour gallons of cheap vodka into a big fuel can. Everyone wondered why I hung out in the garage all night. I like to work on different shit but I really liked getting shit faced. Moved on to pills after an injury and then life got really bad. 5 years clean baby!
I’m a Japanese and was surprised to know that Zima is only sold in Japan currently. I don’t think it’s “big” in Japan though. Never been so. Among that category, Chu-hi is the most selling kind in the market by far. I would personally go with Smirnoff over Zima.
It's only sold in japan now? A couple years ago my mom bought a 6 pack of it from the grocery store because she remembered how popular it was in the 90's. She told me that it tasted like sprite, or 7up. It doesn't, its awful
The heck you say! I'd be all about that sake. The first time I had it, totally NOT what I was expecting! But now I love it. I can't stand super-sweet sugar fruity alcoholic beverages. Huh, even non-alcoholic. Every once in awhile I'll enjoy a good ginger beer. I can't even remember the last time I had a soda pop!
I was a supplier to Coors Memphis in the early 2000's, and they said then the only thing keeping Zima alive was the huge profit margin. The cost to produce was lower than their traditional beer, yet the drink was sold at a slight premium in price. That's great product development.
@@3_up_moon Because that's not how they made it. I don't know where this guy got that information. They brewed the cheapest grain, never added hops, rarely used barley. The stand time in the brewing tuns was about 1/3 the time as real beer which was the most drastic cost saving. Perhaps he should have said they stripped the standard beer recipe. That would be pretty much true.
@@eggsngritstn It's not 100% clear (no pun intended) and I could be wrong, but I thought the video stated beer being filtered through charcoal was how the *prototype* for Zima was made.
I was 30 and I enjoyed it. I wasn't a huge drinker, but sometimes I just was in the mood for something light and refreshing. Not all alcoholic drinks have to hit you like a ton of bricks.
My best friend once tricked his mother into buying him Everclear under the guise of needing PGA for a school science project. Never did that science project, but we _did_ discover Waffle House hash browns come up the same way they went down.
I had kinda the opposite happen... I was 18-ish. My dad found my beer and Zima stash and confronted me. He said he wasn't upset about the beer, but was upset about the Zima. I don't remember exactly what he said but he was under the assumption that Zima was a stronger, higher alcohol content drink.
Zima was amazing. If you’ve ever lived in a really hot and humid climate, you will understand its appeal. It was the perfect lawn care/summer afternoon cold beverage. It was like a tangy alcoholic sprite. I will never apologize for loving the stuff.
Hey! Never tried Zima, as I'm from Germany. But you might try a "Radler", which is very popular in the summer. It's half sprite/half beer mixed together. Of course, it has to be ice cold.
The title makes you think that Zima failed cuz it tastes awful, but apparently it tastes just fine, it just wasn’t a “manly” enough beverage. If it tastes good who cares?
I may be a 28 month clean alcoholic, but even I know there was an over reaction to Zima, and it's funny it only seems to be the Malt Beverages that get flack under the vise of for "the kids." I would love to know other alcohols that have a past for being accused of that. I fondly remember the malt beverage Sparks Alcohol Energy drink, and that went away for the kids and to protect health, like they actually care. It's always fun to look back at over reactions from the past, thanks!
I had a buddy who drank Sparks, until I taught him to drink beer. It's kind of sad though. I don't drink at all anymore, and he's a hardcore alcoholic.
Might not be a good idea for you to be clicking on videos about booze. Just saying...could eventually trigger a relapse -- or at least start you thinking about it, which leads to desire.
as a teenager, when Zima came out, I have to say I liked it. My friends and I didn’t consider it “beer” per say but we would drink it. It was like grapefruit flavor to me. At least as far as I can remember. I remember one of my friends grandma would keep her fridge full of it and she thought it wasn’t really beer as well, so she allowed us to drink our fill.
It was way better than the way overly sweet Mikes and other products like that. I think the new versions of these malted beverages are gross. Zima was just marketed wrong and came out at the wrong time. You cant market that to beer drinkers. But I love good beer too.
@@fmilton20 it was! Just sweet enough. We wonder why people are so fat these days and that’s because everything that is on the market is absolutely full of sugar.
Seriously. It's weird, I like non alcoholic selzter but the alcoholic stuff tastes like I should be cleaning with it. Just give me a beer or a mixed drink.
I doubt it. Flavorless is just carbonated water whereas zima taste like as*. Tonic water is the only disgusting carbonated water but you can't call it flavorless. Tonic water has this harsh bitter taste to it. Gin and tonic is a drink old people like and even then the tonic water overpowers the gin.
I was in my twenties when Zima came out. I actually really liked it. Since I am a woman it was interesting to hear that women were not the intended market but we became the main market. Also, the Reddit comment about Zima tasting like lemon flavored horse piss made me smile since people generally don't drink horse urine for taste comparison. But you never know.
I was in my twenties also. I can remember drinking twice when it first came out; the first time to try it and the second time to give it another chance, as I didn't love it the first time. After that, I went back to beer and, regrettably, doing shots as twenty somethings will do. As to the horse piss comment, I also wondered how they got their baseline for a true comparison. Lmao.
Having been in 1st CAV I can say that you don't have to drink it to have an idea of what horse urine tastes like. The smell gives you a strong insight . . . .
I remember liking MD 20/20 and Night Train and Thunderbird, bottom-level hobo drinks but at least they actually tasted pretty good. One of them tastes like Felix/Fusen gum from Japan.
Zima, my first try at alcohol in high school. I had no idea why people loved it, it was lackluster and didn't get buzzed but saw plenty girls get "wasted" for attention. Ah, 90s high school parties.
When they brought Zima back for one summer a few years ago I tried it with a bunch of friends. One of them summed up the Zima experience perfectly: "it's not good, it's not bad, it's just... Zima."
I was a college sophomore in 1993. Zima was perfect for people like me. I wanted a cold adult beverage but didn't care for beer. Skyy Blue and Smirnoff Ice displaced it. Then came the hard lemonades, etc. Eventually I learned to forego carbonated beverages altogether and developed a taste for hard liquor.
That’s what it’s called! I was thinking four loco or whatever, but that’s the white girl wasted drink today, white claw. I’ve never tried either one, as I’m a full grown adult who can handle beer, wine, and booze, but I was trying to remember this.
If you want a close approximation of Zima just mix about 30% sprite/7up with about 70% light beer. I tried Zima during the 2019 re-release. I liked it a lot actually.
When I was in my early teens my uncle’s and grand parents would let me drink all the Zima I wanted because they didn’t consider it real alcohol. I was drunk any time I went to see them and it was a lot of fun. Just looking at the six pack sends all this nostalgia my way. For anyone who never got the chance it tasted like flat sprite but fizzy.
My girlfriends and I were team original Zima! Loved this stuff since we were not beer drinkers. So we drank Bartles&James wine coolers, Zima and E&J Gallo wine in a box. Yep we were classy. If I could find it, I’d have one this weekend. RIP Zima
Zima starts life as really awful beer. Then it gets filtered so it tastes like nothing. Then it gets citrus flavored. Technically speaking, though, it's still a kind of beer.
Honestly, I liked it. I was in my 20s when it came out and it didn’t have the intense alcohol smell. As I was descending quickly into alcoholism, it allowed my to “hide it” better. It didn’t work, but I did drink a lot of it. :-)
I actually liked Zimas malt flavor profile. I wish they re released it during summer months again. it's actually quite refreshing compared to white claws'flat taste.
I tried Zima for the first time during the 2017 limited release. I liked it. It’s certainly better than all the wine coolers and white claws we have today.
I do not mind White Claw if the right flavors in the very middle of hottest part of summer. Do not have Bud Light Lime or similar Bud Light__ fruit flavors and Margarita (despite the Margarita being good), they have enough aspartame to hurt 95% of the population that can't digest aspartame. I do like taking Mikes hard Lemonade and Twisted at ~50/50 to make what I call an Arnold Schwarzenegger the most in summer though both have to be bottle as from the can Twisted Tea is flat, and Mikes hard Lemonade is bad. Never liked Wine Coolers as most just taste fake or fruits that do not mix. The other I like a newer drink from Michelob Ultra, a drink similar to White Claw.
@@etuanno Try the beyond easy drink mix I make that I call it an Arnold Schwarzenegger, it is like a standard Arnold Palmer but with alcohol to the drink.
I really don't like drinking anything less than 8% alcohol, I just find that the "usual" 4.5% makes me feel kinda gross with all the liquid I end up consuming.
I was born in the mid 90s and I’m not American so I love learning about all the nostalgic food everyone had. I haven’t heard of this drink before but loved watching the video 😅🥰
You didn’t miss much. It’s beer for people who can’t handle beer. Then in the early ‘00s, it was Smirnoff Ice. Now I think it’s 4 loco or something but I’m a 40 year old woman who can handle real beer, wine, and liquor, so I’m not sure how people get white girl wasted these days.
I will say, it was definitely the progenitor of a whole category of popular malt beverages that arrived years later. Namely Smirnoff Ice and all the similar citrus-flavored alcoholic malt beverages that literally every brand came out with at the time. You could try something new from every brand, with new flavor variants cropping up every week it seemed. Zima was just a little ahead of its time, and became the unfortunate punchline of the time.
I drank Zima in 2017, and kind of loved it. I brought it to a party as a joke, and it was really well received. I definitely wasn't the only person who enjoyed it.
I was fine with Zima, which came out around the time I was in college. I'm not really a drinker, but I'd probably get a six-pack maybe once a year if they still sold it. Smirnoff Ice is good, too. I like the Mojito flavor the best.
with the rise of seltzers like white claw, it's time for Zima to make a come back. I've talked to a few people that say some of the more popular ones out there taste like Zimas various flavours
I guess it's the same thing because whiteclaws taste awful. It's like a seltzer but the flavorings and artificial sweeteners make it taste like industrial chemicals.
I bought some Zima during one of the re-releases. It tastes like an off-brand Smirnoff Ice. It's like the RC Cola of non-beers that has been sitting in the summer heat of a car for a week. It's not undrinkable, but you take a sip of it and immediately think you could be drinking something better. If they had just not fucked up the flavour, it'd probably be one of the most popular drinks today.
Honestly some people liked it better than Smirnoff ice because it was less sweet and a little more tart. People who like tart lemonade liked Zima also Mikes hard lemonade cut into both Zima Smirnoff ice’s popularity.
@@grahamparks1645 I never had a Zima but Smirnoff is so sweet it makes me sick just thinking about it. That shit will give you diabetes before it gives you a buzz.
when I lived in Japan we would clear out the beer vending machine at the park everynight. The only thing left at the end of the night was Zima and some odd fruit/crab juice flavored chu-hi. we drank those too... but went for the crab juice first.
Just curious... how does a beer vending machine work? Is there any way they verify your age? I know alcohol laws aren't as strict in other countries as they are in The States but that sounds so foreign to me.
@@muffy1556 It's more so that they don't expect underage drinking to actually happen, and oddly enough it is comparatively rare for if that kind of thing existed in the states for example.
Damn, I LOVED Zima. I am a Canadian male, so didn't get a whole lot of chances to drink Zima but I LOVED that taste whenever I got a chance to go shopping across the line I'd buy as much as I could get across the border. Mind you, I feel bad for you poor Yanks having to drink a malt-based Smirnoff Ice. The Canadian Vodka-based Ice is about a thousand times better tasting. ;-)
Love those documentaries. It's always interesting to learn about the history of what we eat and drink. Thanks for all the research! I'd love to try that for my channel someday, if it comes back again (any chance to find it in Canada?).
As a 90s teen, watermelon jolly ranchers and Zima was my go to. By the time I was legal, it was gone. I also loved crystal Pepsi and buy a case every time it comes back.
The trivial thing I always remember about it is that it was obviously visible as available in the background of the bar on the science-fiction TV show Babylon 5. The creator of the show has said something to the effect that they thought it was an utterly hilarious concept that *this* would still be available a couple of hundred years in the future. Now, I just imagine it's one of the ongoing limited re-releases.
Can you do a video about the fall of wine coolers that dominated the 70s and 80s? Was once incredibly popular but was largely discarded by companies once legislation passed that raised taxes on wine. This lead directly to the rise of flavored malt beverages as the natural successor to the wine coolers that were being migrated away from.
@@toomanyaccounts Nope. Wine coolers have fruit juice in them. Boxed wine does not, unless there's been some developments in the boxed wine world in the last 10 years, which is possble.
loved zima as a kid. they brought it back a few years ago. local beer store had a pallet. bought several cases. it was like a time machine. i could drink zima but not hard mikes/smirnof. 2+ feels like broken glass in my stomach. i wish theyd bring this back.🍻
I liked it, and unlike most of the commenters, I was 40 when it came out. I never liked beer, so I appreciated something else to drink in its place. Somehow it always reminded me of a gin and tonic in its taste.
I don’t know what it is, but Crystal Pepsi evokes the most strong feelings of nostalgia for me. I didn’t particularly like it or care too much about it when it came out. But when I see those colors and that font, it brings me right back to 1992!
@@ANSWERTHECALLOFJESUSCHRIST as someone who was a mid teenager when they rereleased it. I genuinely enjoyed it and it was just fashionable. I still miss it
Funny. I never got any notifications anybody replied until blackjacks was sent to me. I hate it how TH-cam seems to pick and choose what it will notify you on. Anyway, here's to the memories!
It’s very interesting seeing a beverage basically be a proto version of what is now a really popular drink, and it failing to do what the company wanted it to do. I’m kind of curious how well or poorly it would handle today’s market
I'd laugh if they reissued it today under a completely different name, and it did like REALLY well. Like excise the "Zima" name baggage, don't tell anyone it's the same formula(s) and re-badge it something else as a competitor to Mike's Hard Lemonade, et al. Would anyone ever really know, or care? I mean at some point it's all just flavored booze, right?
They rebooted it for a limited time in 2018. My local area couldn't keep it in stock. The Coors's Brewing Company still owns the trademark and right to it. There was talk before Covid-19 about another limited run but sadly the pandemic killed it.
I grew up in the 80's and 90's and the way I remember it, you officially lost your man card if you were ever caught drinking a Zima. It was for lily livered limp wristed art students. There's too many of us still around who remember that. The Zima branding makes it a non starter regardless of the drink itself.
Need to do a video on California Coolers. They were the first coolers that came out and had real wine until something happened where they had to switch over to making them a malt based beverage. They were never good after the switch
Zima will forever be locked in my memory as what I drank during a certain blind date in summer 1997. Dude was not for me (I liked his dog though), I had a boring time, so no more that guy and no more Zima. I was 23 at that time. Now I'd only have Zima if there was nothing else, and if there was lemon or lime to mix in. I'd rather have sparkling mineral water.
I was in my 20s when Zima came out. I didn't like wine or beer because they weren't sweet, and I wasn't willing to spend big money on mixed drinks at a bar. Wine coolers were my first go-to drink, because (as far as I know) they were the first sweet+carbonated+light alcoholic beverage (that wasn't a liqueur) that you could ever buy right off the shelf. When Zima came out, it was much better, and I liked the taste. It was exactly what it set out to be: 7-Up with a malt background and alcohol. Anyway, I'd drink it again if it came out.
People may not realize how big Zima is in Japan. There were two guys in Japan around me who were super hardcore Zima drinkers. One was my roommate who always had a couple crates of Zima in his fridge no matter what. It's ok for fridge to not have food or water, but if it ran out of Zima, all hell would burst loose. Another guy I knew worked at 7/11 in Japan. He could delay paying his rent, but he had to get his supply of Zima first. He even bragged alot about how he steals Zima from his 7/11 when he has no money, and no one has ever noticed it.
I had zima when they re-released it in 2017, it really does just taste like a watered down sprite with a bit of citrus tartness. It basically was the same thing as the mikes hard lemonades these days, they use the same malt process to make the alcohol, so trying to market to men was a hilariously bad marketing decision in the first place. The Zima myth is crazy haha, they forgot about chemistry 😒
I still have a couple of cases of this stuff in cold storage from the 2017 re-release. It is probably even more undrinkable than it was in 2017... or the 1990s. Still it is a strong association with pleasant memories of the 20th century. I hope it is produced again.
The way I remember it tasting was seltzer water, the flavor they used in another 90s product, Fruit-A-Burst gum, and low grade vodka. Once in a lifetime is more than enough.
You should definitely do a video on Julia Child. She was so important in bringing French cooking and more over bringing modern cooking technique to the USA.
I remember when I first moved here to Japan and went into a convenience store and saw Zima! I immediately had to buy it to relive those sweet, sweet junior high days when a friend having a six pack of zima hidden in their bedroom during a sleep over was the height of cool. LOL The sakura flavor is actually not awful. I think some of the success of zima in Japan can also be attributed to a popular type of drink called Chuhi which is similar, has many different brands and comes in seemingly endless flavors but most popular is lemon-lime.
Yeah but Chuhi is better than Zima any day. It's one of those things I miss about Japan is being able to get a seasonal can of Chuhi from the local Yamaya every so often.
a friend of mine lived there for a while as a JET, and told us tales of Suntory Strong Zero vending machines by his house. I'm still waiting on my cans of it. he called that brand Gods Own Zima.
0:00 Statistically, half of us who grew up in the 90's are horribly depressed and much of that group is unlikely to feel any nostalgia. But sure go ahead, nostalgia is the only tool you have when you got nothing else going for your video.
I'm really surprised to hear so many people didn't like it. It was like a less sweet Smirnoff Ice with a more citrusy taste. At all the parties we had, the only people that scoffed at drinking it was dudes afraid to drink a "girly drink" until we showed them the alcohol percentage. I couldn't drink them all the time but they were a fantastic change of pace from Natty and everclear.
I mean Zima was about in line with your average light beer as far as ABV went. Speaking as someone who regularly enjoys a stout or an IPA though it always amuses me when I hear about college dudes thinking that
@@SavageGreywolf Back in those college days options for "powerful" alcoholic beverages were limited to malt liquor or things like Steel Reserve. Being a broke college dude we settled for whatever was cheapest and gave us the most bang for our buck most of the time. Zima had this weird stigma of being a low alcohol content win cooler back then so showing that it was 4.7% was a big deal- so to speak. Also, there were times we were stuck with getting beer from a gas station and back then they couldn't sell beer with percentages above 3.2% in Colorado/Utah.
I loved Zima when they brought it back a few years ago. Oddly enough now that I’m thinking of it again I kind of feel wistful remembering the great summer I had that year, I miss everybody and the experiences I had. I think we associate things with the times we had with them. It’s just funny how seeing a picture of this stuff made me feel.
I remember being a kid seeing the zima commercials all the time, thinking I couldn't wait to try it when I got older, only to find out it was long gone. Then I moved to Japan and was shocked to see it was everywhere. I drink it all the time here, its actually pretty good.
I was not old enough to drink when it first came out, but I remember the advertising because it was inescapable. Re: the modern alternative drinks, I once worked in a grocery store that did NOT have a liquor license, who got a whole shipment of Mike's Hard Lemonade without knowing it was alcohol. It was out and on display for maybe a day or two before the error was realized and they sent it back to the distributor. So I can see how there was some confusion about "alternative" drinks. The grocery order person was like I JUST THOUGHT IT WAS FANCY LEMONADE! ...we were a health food store, after all. xD
I actually LIKED Zima. It was a nice change from the nasty regular beer my friends drank. I mean, Natty was nasty, at least Zima tasted better. I didn't drink it to get drunk, I drank it because I liked it. Never got drunk in those days. Didn't need to or want to.
It seemed like something I would have enjoyed if I was the legal drinking age then. But by the time I was legal Zima was already long gone. Also I much prefer malt coolers to regular beer.
Never had a Zima, but when I was in my late 20's I did enjoy wine coolers. I loved wine cooler ads featuring the folksy Bartles & James, and the cool rockin' Bruce Willis.
Back in the day I wasn't impressed w/Zima. I was legally able to drink at 19 so going out for a beer was normal. But I did support Frank and Ed. Politically, they would have been just fine in the White House back then and while thinking about it, even more so today 🤣.
Zima ruled, I'll never forget as a young teen riding my MO'ped with a clanking backpack full of Zima to meet my buddy in the woods and get hammered, man those where the days 🤘
Zima was an outgrowth of the wine cooler fad. In the mid 80s wine coolers were huge. There were "classier" brands like Bartles & James, but for the aspiring underage drinker there were the fine beverages of Mogen David. They (still) make MD 20/20 fortified wine, the hallowed (and cringe inducing) Mad Dog. But during the wine cooler heyday they had myriad flavors of 20/20 Wine Coolers...in TWO LITER BOTTLES. Peach, Berry, etc. In 1986 they cost something like $2.49 a bottle. They were a staple of teen binge drinking in my formative years.
@@munkandbear2818 I can't say that I do, even after looking it up. Here on the left coast of the US about the only "Australian" import we got was Fosters, which of course was/is brewed in Canada.
Zima tastes fine. It ought to be brought back, with all the other weird beer tastes, it is no longer as”out of the ordinary” taste it was when originally released.🤷🏼♂️
@@artcarrasco9 watching the rest of the video, maybe it was during one of those limited releases. We were just hanging around drinking when someone mentioned Zima and they said you can get Zima here, so we drank a couple.
You can still get Zima in Japan sometimes. I like it. It tastes good and it doesn't give me a hangover for some reason. There are different flavours too. I wish I saw it around more because I'd rather have it than a beer or something else than has detrimental effects. Zima you just get a buzz, but don't feel bad after.
You’d think with the rise of similar drinks now and nostalgia at its highest rn that they’d bring back Zima with an improved tweaked recipe. If they manage to improve the flavor enough, they would dominate white claws
As one of those teenagers of the early-nineties, I can confirm we had people buy it for us for exactly those reasons stated: Clear, didn't smell like booze, and mixed well with just about anything. But oh god, the heartburn...
I drank it as teen as well as all my friends. I remember it tasting good until they changed the formula. Once they changed it I remember all of us tasting it and saying nope.
Zima was ubiquitous when I was in high school. There was definitely the whole “it doesn’t show up in breathalyzer tests” myth, but I also think it was popular because of its low alcohol content. It didn’t hit an underage drinker the same way normal beer would.
A few years ago I worked at a beer distributor and for some reason Zima was back on the shelves for a limited time and it was FLYING off the shelves it was nuts. I finally got to try it since I was a kid when it came out, it tasted like dusty lemons.
When I heard about this channel I was like I don't know if I really want to watch a bunch of videos about food history but I've watched each episode as it came out so yeah I'm going to subscribe To be honest the narrator seals of the deal
When I was living in America in the 90s, I now live in Norway, I tried Zima and I loved it! All my friends thought that I was weird for drinking it because they thought it tasted nasty. The other thing. Surge is discontinued in America? It's still a huge hit here in Norway but it's called Urge here. Big hit with the kids and teens.
Dude they took surge off the market here because it had a toxic ingredient. I'm not even joking. I forget the name of the chemical. The FDA banned it, and the makers of surge would have had to reformulate.. Instead of going to that expense, they just discontinued it. I'm not making this up. Don't drink that shit.
I remember my first job as a cashier Zima was popular for people who weren't real drinkers, because Zima was like Sprite . Anyone who wanted to drink usually went with something stronger.
@@blaquenoise exactly. Even when i first started drinking, i started on the classics; jugs of wine, beers, cheap liquors, and moved onto more high-end brandies and apple ciders. idk Zima and other seltzers kinda just feel like "i wanna be an alcoholic but have none of the class that it comes with" it feels like something that teenage edgelords drink. Like, 'cause if they're a inexperienced woman, a wine cooler or wine works; inexperienced man, just a beer or cider; if they're experienced and want something fruity and hard, they're gonna make or order a mix drink; stereotypically, men would get darker liquors in more pungent mixes (generally whiskey and coke or old fashioned) or a dirty martini; while more experienced women generally throw back fruitier/savory mixes or just know her beer. Like, i mean, i walk into a classy bar and order a "dirty martini, shaken, keep the pit" it'll look way cooler and classier than "yall got white claw orange?
Being too young to have it in it's heyday, luckily I had a chance to have it recently. I think there was a brief resurgence around 2017 or so. I know it's been continually produced in Japan. I managed to get a 6 pack and honestly I liked it. I dunno if it's exactly the same as it was in 90s, but it wasn't bad.
I was a college freshman in 1994. Zima and Jolly Ranchers was my drink of choice. Also my roommate and I found a kitten outside of our dorm one night and she was smuggled in and of course named Zima lol. My mom took the cat in when we got caught. Zima lived a long happy life.
That's a wonderful story!
This cat story is amazing! 😃😊😆
Zima and Jolly Ranchers sounds gross, and I drank a bottle of rootbeer schnapps once.
@@BiggestBigBoy LOL!
I enjoyed Zima in college, too. I was a freshman in 1993.😀
Coors really, really wanted Zima to be a hit because it could be made with the lowest-grade, cheapest grain, and minimal effort - normally, this would have just made for an unbelievably awful beer, but the charcoal filtering stripping everything out left it relatively neutral. Then you just re-introduce some citrus flavoring agent, and bam, you sell it for as much as regular beer, but manufactured for a significantly lower cost.
This is also why alco-seltzers are getting big marketing pushes. They're the spiritual successor to Zima, made along the same lines: with super cheap ingredients for a higher profit margin.
I used to regret that I couldn't at least try zima once...until I've read your comment.
Thanks. Knowing what zima actually is, I'm glad to know it only as a pop culture punchline.
Imagine...if it was so popular it could replace or at least largely substitute beer. That world would be my own personal hell.
@@evanharrison4054 Zima is delicious and it's still sold
@@ThisIsSolution So is spritzer lemonade with a dash of vodka and maybe a bit of zest.
At least as far as I can tell from the description, that's roughly what Zima is.
You're probably wrong about the it still being sold part, though. Japan discontinued it in 2021 and the last time new stock was manufactured by Coors was in 2018.
I mean technically, you can still find them in some stores, but at this point it's likely a very finite resource, at least until they make new batches again.
Hopefully I can snag me a bottle somehow before the last one is drunk. So many of my favorite tv shows referenced it that at this point, I'd consider it a life not well lived if I miss out on knowing what it's like.
If it's anything like American chocolate or American cheese, then at least I'll be in on the joke the next time around.
Now this hits the nail on the head/makes lots of sense - always follow the money
@@evanharrison4054 just drink white claw , trulys or any other seltzer water alcohol nowadays , I think that would match the experience quite well
The "famous Japanese actor" shown is actually Tanahashi, a professional wrestler from New Japan Pro Wrestling. He is VERY popular in Japan.
GO ACE
Lol did not expect to see Hiroshi Tanahashi in a video about shitty beer
Honestly the ribbed sides made it feel so cool In your hand
They did a promotion in Japan where you could get free NJPW trading cards on some bottles! Tanahashi even got his own flavor: "High Fly Lemon"
I came to post this, glad others noticed. I had no idea he was in a Zima commercial. He won’t be sharing one with CM Punk after their match this month though.
Zima is still sold at clubs in Japan, never knew it was a drink from the 90’s. Great video
Zima's packaging looks shockingly modern considering it's almost 30 years old
You'll notice a pattern in history, if you're clever and observant. Everything old becomes new again. That packaging would have been called Art Deco in the 1930's.
@@bigguy7353 litteraly what's happening right now, I'm 21 so I'm not super old, but already noticing little things like the art style of cartoons, and the parachute pants and loose clothing teenagers are starting to wear again, the Lauren hill inspired music, it's like the late 80s and 90s all over again and teens swear there pioneering a wave 🤣🤣🤣
@@velezpressurewashing5749 When I was a kid in the '90s, 'flare-leg' jeans were popular with girls. Same exact thing as bell bottom jeans in the '70s, lol.
@@Excalion88 bell bottom jeans were semi popular in the mid to late 2000s
@@Excalion88 jnco 😆
I will remember Zema for the rest of my life because it was the first drink to get me somewhat drunk when I was 13-14. My parent dropped me off at the local sledding hill with my friends. In the parking lot I somehow miraculously uncovered a 6 pack of Zima that someone had buried in the snow presumably to keep cold, with 5 remaining. I smuggled them home until I had the courage to drink 3 one night. And holy moly was that a great night. Watching Futurama and getting tipsy and then playing Perfect Dark while my parents slept. Great times.
Those kinds of memories are always the best. I remember being in high school and stealing a bottle of super, super old red wine from the wine shelf in the basement. Since it had been sitting there for 20+ years, it tasted super musty and just disgusting. That didn’t stop me from drinking the whole damn thing in one afternoon then promptly vomiting the next morning. Ahhh… good times 😂
I’m gonna have my own party with Zima and hookers!
I remember my first drunk moment at 14. Drinking Molson XXX with some friends in a tent in November. The one friend brought an old kerosene tent heater that his stepdad insisted he bring.
We only had 2 or 3 beers but were feeling absolutely hammered. Then we started puking and developed horrible headaches.
And that was the first time we had carbon monoxide poisoning.....😂
@@Sniperboy5551as a high schooler that must of been pretty pricey to replace
i remember being in highschool and drinking stealing my dads car and running over stray pets.
I will always have a soft spot for Zima in my heart: the first alcohol that ever made me throw up ❤️
lol
LMAO
You got lucky. Mine was Old Milwaukee.🤮
😂
Ahh, memories!🤮😂😹🤣
My mom quit drinking for 15 years until Zima. She was a full blown alcoholic after one taste. Needless to say, the rest of my childhood was traumatic lol
Lol imagine going alcoholic for Zima, of all drinks
I’m sorry for your traumatic childhood, but WHAT?? Breaking sobriety over 5% vol piss water is wild. At least go for the handle of vodka like an adult 😂
Wow do you need me to coddle you? To validate your childhood? Get over it MILLIONS of people have had the same experience and don't try to get "likes".
Good.
@@coyotelong4349they was gateway drinks lol wine coolers are period
I was a raging alcoholic for decades. There was a period of time when my wife didn’t think zima was real beer (which I know, I know) so I drank that crap by the case. Terrible heartburn. But I was drunk.
Hell yeah, as long as it had alcohol in it. But now, it's weak as water. No point in drinking anything under 8% ABV; takes too much to get a buzz.
That's funny. I used to pour gallons of cheap vodka into a big fuel can. Everyone wondered why I hung out in the garage all night. I like to work on different shit but I really liked getting shit faced. Moved on to pills after an injury and then life got really bad. 5 years clean baby!
@@mma1st105 congratulations on staying clean. Keep it going!
@@nathanielovaughn2145 damn, dude. 8% is my baseline and im almost 19, but that's partly due to my weight :skull:/:rofl:
@@mma1st105 5 years!!!!!!
I’m a Japanese and was surprised to know that Zima is only sold in Japan currently. I don’t think it’s “big” in Japan though. Never been so. Among that category, Chu-hi is the most selling kind in the market by far. I would personally go with Smirnoff over Zima.
It's only sold in japan now? A couple years ago my mom bought a 6 pack of it from the grocery store because she remembered how popular it was in the 90's. She told me that it tasted like sprite, or 7up. It doesn't, its awful
how much would you charge me to send me a crate of zima to the states?
I preferred chu-hi, but I’m an American that needs his sugar.
@@marroonrider3193 how much would you charge me to send a bottle, aquired via your last comment hopefully, across the states?
The heck you say! I'd be all about that sake. The first time I had it, totally NOT what I was expecting! But now I love it. I can't stand super-sweet sugar fruity alcoholic beverages. Huh, even non-alcoholic. Every once in awhile I'll enjoy a good ginger beer. I can't even remember the last time I had a soda pop!
I was a supplier to Coors Memphis in the early 2000's, and they said then the only thing keeping Zima alive was the huge profit margin. The cost to produce was lower than their traditional beer, yet the drink was sold at a slight premium in price. That's great product development.
How was the cost to produce less than beer when they said they had to make beer then strip it?
@@3_up_moon Because that's not how they made it. I don't know where this guy got that information. They brewed the cheapest grain, never added hops, rarely used barley. The stand time in the brewing tuns was about 1/3 the time as real beer which was the most drastic cost saving. Perhaps he should have said they stripped the standard beer recipe. That would be pretty much true.
@@eggsngritstn It's not 100% clear (no pun intended) and I could be wrong, but I thought the video stated beer being filtered through charcoal was how the *prototype* for Zima was made.
Then you must know that club 616 served hella Zima... (and Platinum Plus too)
Thats also why its funny California thought taxing it like actual liquor would do anything. Malt liquor in any form is stupidly cheap to make and buy.
I was 30 and I enjoyed it. I wasn't a huge drinker, but sometimes I just was in the mood for something light and refreshing. Not all alcoholic drinks have to hit you like a ton of bricks.
As teenagers we tricked a friend's grandma into buying us Zima. We told her it was a new soft drink.
Some of my friends got away with this!! Not my mom tho. Mama wasn't no fool.. lol
Grandma knew it was alcoholic but she didn't care because it was Zima and she knew it would be undrinkable.
My best friend once tricked his mother into buying him Everclear under the guise of needing PGA for a school science project. Never did that science project, but we _did_ discover Waffle House hash browns come up the same way they went down.
She probably knew and bought it for ya’ anyways to secure her name as TheCoolGrandma! 😎👵🏻
I had kinda the opposite happen... I was 18-ish. My dad found my beer and Zima stash and confronted me. He said he wasn't upset about the beer, but was upset about the Zima. I don't remember exactly what he said but he was under the assumption that Zima was a stronger, higher alcohol content drink.
Zima was amazing.
If you’ve ever lived in a really hot and humid climate, you will understand its appeal. It was the perfect lawn care/summer afternoon cold beverage. It was like a tangy alcoholic sprite.
I will never apologize for loving the stuff.
Hey! Never tried Zima, as I'm from Germany. But you might try a "Radler", which is very popular in the summer. It's half sprite/half beer mixed together. Of course, it has to be ice cold.
It was better than any of the currently available drinks I've tried.
Agree. I liked the stuff and was disappointed when it was no longer available.
just get a good alcoholic cider. always refreshing, and the only booze to always have nutritional facts.... for some reason 🤷♂️
The title makes you think that Zima failed cuz it tastes awful, but apparently it tastes just fine, it just wasn’t a “manly” enough beverage. If it tastes good who cares?
As a nineties kid, my parents always had Zima in the fridge. I swear they never drank it, but it was just always there.
Maybe to scare away guests?
Word
A friend still has one. Its an artifact now lol
Great guy, perpetually in college
Maybe it was always there, because they would never drink Zima?
They wanted to tempt you to drink it, bc it’s got that soft drink appeal that might work on kids. Soda pop that gets you lit. 👌🏻🥴😵💫
I may be a 28 month clean alcoholic, but even I know there was an over reaction to Zima, and it's funny it only seems to be the Malt Beverages that get flack under the vise of for "the kids." I would love to know other alcohols that have a past for being accused of that. I fondly remember the malt beverage Sparks Alcohol Energy drink, and that went away for the kids and to protect health, like they actually care. It's always fun to look back at over reactions from the past, thanks!
I salute your sobriety 🤜🤛
I had a buddy who drank Sparks, until I taught him to drink beer. It's kind of sad though. I don't drink at all anymore, and he's a hardcore alcoholic.
Might not be a good idea for you to be clicking on videos about booze.
Just saying...could eventually trigger a relapse -- or at least start you thinking about it, which leads to desire.
@@AdamsOlympia Brooks is having a few cold ones right now LOL
I don’t drink any more but even as a teenager I didn’t want to drink that shit. It wasn’t cool and didn’t taste very good.
as a teenager, when Zima came out, I have to say I liked it. My friends and I didn’t consider it “beer” per say but we would drink it. It was like grapefruit flavor to me. At least as far as I can remember. I remember one of my friends grandma would keep her fridge full of it and she thought it wasn’t really beer as well, so she allowed us to drink our fill.
It was way better than the way overly sweet Mikes and other products like that. I think the new versions of these malted beverages are gross. Zima was just marketed wrong and came out at the wrong time. You cant market that to beer drinkers. But I love good beer too.
Same. It was kinda a sweet grapefruit/lime flavor to me. And it was easy to drink.
@@fmilton20 it was! Just sweet enough. We wonder why people are so fat these days and that’s because everything that is on the market is absolutely full of sugar.
I tried Zima during the 2017 re-release, and I liked it a lot better than the flavorless seltzer drinks that everyone seems to like nowadays.
flavorless? someone get this man a high noon
@@araybeezy1653 lol... relative to other shit seltzer drinks it has a modicum of flavor. It's still garbage compared to Zima.
Me too Zima is delicious
Seriously. It's weird, I like non alcoholic selzter but the alcoholic stuff tastes like I should be cleaning with it. Just give me a beer or a mixed drink.
I doubt it. Flavorless is just carbonated water whereas zima taste like as*. Tonic water is the only disgusting carbonated water but you can't call it flavorless. Tonic water has this harsh bitter taste to it. Gin and tonic is a drink old people like and even then the tonic water overpowers the gin.
I was in my twenties when Zima came out. I actually really liked it. Since I am a woman it was interesting to hear that women were not the intended market but we became the main market. Also, the Reddit comment about Zima tasting like lemon flavored horse piss made me smile since people generally don't drink horse urine for taste comparison. But you never know.
Saying something tastes like (insert descriptor) piss is just saying it's horrible. Corona = Mexican donkey piss, Molson = Canadian moose piss, etc.
😂🤣😂 I liked it too. I was in my 20s as well.
I was in my twenties also. I can remember drinking twice when it first came out; the first time to try it and the second time to give it another chance, as I didn't love it the first time. After that, I went back to beer and, regrettably, doing shots as twenty somethings will do.
As to the horse piss comment, I also wondered how they got their baseline for a true comparison. Lmao.
Having been in 1st CAV I can say that you don't have to drink it to have an idea of what horse urine tastes like.
The smell gives you a strong insight . . . .
Never swallowed any Zima myself but had cased content in the carport
for half a year. A red Santa costume accepted the proffered gift.
As a male of a certain age in the mid 90's, I loved Zima and was bummed they slowly disappeared from shelves of my local mini-mart.
I remember liking MD 20/20 and Night Train and Thunderbird, bottom-level hobo drinks but at least they actually tasted pretty good. One of them tastes like Felix/Fusen gum from Japan.
Zima, my first try at alcohol in high school. I had no idea why people loved it, it was lackluster and didn't get buzzed but saw plenty girls get "wasted" for attention. Ah, 90s high school parties.
Our teen says the name sounds like a disease. 🤔
When i was growing up it was chelsea, the one half of one percent alcohol drink the government went after hard ... Shame, it wasnt bad.
You make me feel like I missed out. I was too young when it was out
@@jaynenewcomb2094 🤣
It was so much easier to hold down (or throw up) than beer, so the teenyboppers could hold enough to loose capacity to consent. Brilliant.
When they brought Zima back for one summer a few years ago I tried it with a bunch of friends. One of them summed up the Zima experience perfectly: "it's not good, it's not bad, it's just... Zima."
I remember the 90s Zima, I kinda liked it. I also remember the mini resurgence, too. I didn't get any.
That should be the new slogan the next time they revive it.
I was so excited when they rereleased it for that summer.
That's a good description of it. Tried it once and felt the same way.
Tasted better than beer. As in not good, just not terrible.
My mom is not an alcoholic but is perpetually saying “I really want some ZIMA I wonder when they’re gonna bring it back”
They have out here in Japan
Your mom, like all of us who were in our best years back then, just really want the 90s back and hate this new.... whatever this is....
@@pleasuretokill yeah not american but you and me both mate.
@@SatanSavedMe skill issue
Has she tried White Claw? Some people claim it's similar
I was a college sophomore in 1993. Zima was perfect for people like me. I wanted a cold adult beverage but didn't care for beer. Skyy Blue and Smirnoff Ice displaced it. Then came the hard lemonades, etc. Eventually I learned to forego carbonated beverages altogether and developed a taste for hard liquor.
Zima, the White Claw of its day.
That’s what it’s called! I was thinking four loco or whatever, but that’s the white girl wasted drink today, white claw. I’ve never tried either one, as I’m a full grown adult who can handle beer, wine, and booze, but I was trying to remember this.
White Claw tastes great though!
@@TheBLGL
nothing like four loco...
White claw and zima both tastes like carbonated water with very little flavor.
@@aaronharrington1337 the original four loco formula was built diff
Still have a bottle in dad’s fridge.
If you want a close approximation of Zima just mix about 30% sprite/7up with about 70% light beer.
I tried Zima during the 2019 re-release. I liked it a lot actually.
I had some as well don’t remember it being that terrible
Oh wow I actually expected it to be more like Smirnoff ice.
Oh I remember this, it was the first alcohol I ever tried. We would also put jolly ranchers into the bottle to make it taste better.
Haha we did skittles 🤣
@@diabella03 I bet that would have been good too!
We would put it in mason jars and soaked mushrooms in it overnight
That was 2/3 of the recipe 🤣
Green apple jolly rancher Zima awew yeah
When I was in my early teens my uncle’s and grand parents would let me drink all the Zima I wanted because they didn’t consider it real alcohol. I was drunk any time I went to see them and it was a lot of fun. Just looking at the six pack sends all this nostalgia my way. For anyone who never got the chance it tasted like flat sprite but fizzy.
Flat sprite but fizzy? Sooo, sprite?
@@Ken-fh4jc No flat sprite. but fizzy...
My girlfriends and I were team original Zima! Loved this stuff since we were not beer drinkers. So we drank Bartles&James wine coolers, Zima and E&J Gallo wine in a box. Yep we were classy. If I could find it, I’d have one this weekend. RIP Zima
Zima starts life as really awful beer. Then it gets filtered so it tastes like nothing. Then it gets citrus flavored.
Technically speaking, though, it's still a kind of beer.
I miss it as well.
Bartles and James are a bad knock off of the original California Cooler, and they were just malt liquor in disguise.
@@henryknox4511 OMG Henry! You’re right! I remember Cali Coolers.
Honestly, I liked it. I was in my 20s when it came out and it didn’t have the intense alcohol smell. As I was descending quickly into alcoholism, it allowed my to “hide it” better. It didn’t work, but I did drink a lot of it. :-)
I remember these as my go to when I first turned 21 they definitely could give you a buzz then Smirnoff ice took over
When it was all there was, we'd bump it up with 100 proof vodka. Well, I guess the Zima wasn't ALL we had, but the vodka was a bonus.
Same 😉 26 years sober here 💜💙✌️
@@JillShaw
I envy you but am happy for you, proud of you. Live well!
Releasing it for a limited time because "everyone needs to try it one time" is the most brilliant self aware marketing strategy haha
I actually liked Zimas malt flavor profile. I wish they re released it during summer months again. it's actually quite refreshing compared to white claws'flat taste.
I tried Zima for the first time during the 2017 limited release. I liked it. It’s certainly better than all the wine coolers and white claws we have today.
I think it's just spritzer with not enough booze in it
I do not mind White Claw if the right flavors in the very middle of hottest part of summer. Do not have Bud Light Lime or similar Bud Light__ fruit flavors and Margarita (despite the Margarita being good), they have enough aspartame to hurt 95% of the population that can't digest aspartame. I do like taking Mikes hard Lemonade and Twisted at ~50/50 to make what I call an Arnold Schwarzenegger the most in summer though both have to be bottle as from the can Twisted Tea is flat, and Mikes hard Lemonade is bad. Never liked Wine Coolers as most just taste fake or fruits that do not mix. The other I like a newer drink from Michelob Ultra, a drink similar to White Claw.
@@caseysmith544 When it's too hot for a beer I drink Radler/ a 50/50 mix between beer and lemonade.
It's refreshing and tastes great.
@@etuanno Try the beyond easy drink mix I make that I call it an Arnold Schwarzenegger, it is like a standard Arnold Palmer but with alcohol to the drink.
I really don't like drinking anything less than 8% alcohol, I just find that the "usual" 4.5% makes me feel kinda gross with all the liquid I end up consuming.
Keep making as much stuff about the 90s as possible, I love to reminisce about those times, the 90s were the best
Yes they were.. best memories are from the 90's
I was born in the mid 90s and I’m not American so I love learning about all the nostalgic food everyone had. I haven’t heard of this drink before but loved watching the video 😅🥰
You didn’t miss much. It’s beer for people who can’t handle beer. Then in the early ‘00s, it was Smirnoff Ice. Now I think it’s 4 loco or something but I’m a 40 year old woman who can handle real beer, wine, and liquor, so I’m not sure how people get white girl wasted these days.
@@TheBLGL Hard Seltzer.
Now I understand the Futurama joke, „woo hoo, baby wants a Zima“
I will say, it was definitely the progenitor of a whole category of popular malt beverages that arrived years later. Namely Smirnoff Ice and all the similar citrus-flavored alcoholic malt beverages that literally every brand came out with at the time. You could try something new from every brand, with new flavor variants cropping up every week it seemed. Zima was just a little ahead of its time, and became the unfortunate punchline of the time.
Zima is the Sega of booze lol
Mike's Hard Lemonade
I drank WAY too many Mike's Hard Lemonade at high-school parties 🤢
Honestly smirnoff ice isn't that bad, didn't have some for a long time but it pretty much nearly tasted like lemon Schweppes
I drank Zima in 2017, and kind of loved it. I brought it to a party as a joke, and it was really well received. I definitely wasn't the only person who enjoyed it.
I mean, all alcohol absolutely sucks so I doubt anyone noticed the difference, let’s be real.
@@caracalcontinuum3118 if your drinking low end shit then yes it’s gonna suck
I was fine with Zima, which came out around the time I was in college. I'm not really a drinker, but I'd probably get a six-pack maybe once a year if they still sold it. Smirnoff Ice is good, too. I like the Mojito flavor the best.
When I was barley a minor we used to drink these but always added jolly ranchers or skittles to add some actual flavor. Oh also pixie Stix
I had it around that time. It was good
with the rise of seltzers like white claw, it's time for Zima to make a come back. I've talked to a few people that say some of the more popular ones out there taste like Zimas various flavours
I guess it's the same thing because whiteclaws taste awful. It's like a seltzer but the flavorings and artificial sweeteners make it taste like industrial chemicals.
It could be a hit or miss. Young adults would probably see it as a drink for now-aging Gen X-ers.
I've tried Zima and would take it over any of the seltzers I've tried.
They did bring it back a few years ago.
@Drew Scrivers and thats why Ill stick to spirit based wine coolers. High Noons are where its at
I bought some Zima during one of the re-releases. It tastes like an off-brand Smirnoff Ice. It's like the RC Cola of non-beers that has been sitting in the summer heat of a car for a week. It's not undrinkable, but you take a sip of it and immediately think you could be drinking something better. If they had just not fucked up the flavour, it'd probably be one of the most popular drinks today.
Honestly some people liked it better than Smirnoff ice because it was less sweet and a little more tart. People who like tart lemonade liked Zima also Mikes hard lemonade cut into both Zima Smirnoff ice’s popularity.
@@grahamparks1645 I do, smirnoff is gross, zima was ahead of its time.
Royal Crown Cola kicks ass!!
@@grahamparks1645 I never had a Zima but Smirnoff is so sweet it makes me sick just thinking about it. That shit will give you diabetes before it gives you a buzz.
keep dissin rc and we gonna throw hands
when I lived in Japan we would clear out the beer vending machine at the park everynight. The only thing left at the end of the night was Zima and some odd fruit/crab juice flavored chu-hi. we drank those too... but went for the crab juice first.
Just curious... how does a beer vending machine work? Is there any way they verify your age? I know alcohol laws aren't as strict in other countries as they are in The States but that sounds so foreign to me.
@@muffy1556 you put yen in and beer comes out just like a soda machine. except 1 yen coins, nothing takes those, they can't be used for anything.
@@muffy1556 It's more so that they don't expect underage drinking to actually happen, and oddly enough it is comparatively rare for if that kind of thing existed in the states for example.
@@Drkbowers1 pop culture doesnt promote it in japan as they do/did in the US or other countries. more often you'd see old drunks which are everywhere
That's literally a Simpsons joke.
"Mountain Dew or crab juice?"
"Ewww, gross! I'll take a crab juice."
Damn, I LOVED Zima. I am a Canadian male, so didn't get a whole lot of chances to drink Zima but I LOVED that taste whenever I got a chance to go shopping across the line I'd buy as much as I could get across the border. Mind you, I feel bad for you poor Yanks having to drink a malt-based Smirnoff Ice. The Canadian Vodka-based Ice is about a thousand times better tasting. ;-)
Don't worry, not many of us patriots drink it.
Typical Canadian
Love those documentaries. It's always interesting to learn about the history of what we eat and drink.
Thanks for all the research!
I'd love to try that for my channel someday, if it comes back again (any chance to find it in Canada?).
As a 90s teen, watermelon jolly ranchers and Zima was my go to. By the time I was legal, it was gone. I also loved crystal Pepsi and buy a case every time it comes back.
Omg crystal Pepsi! Lol memories
Yeah I also grew up through the 90's, and like you said by the time I hit 21 Zima was long gone lol 😂.
I'm from Mexico and I had no idea the clear drinks trend was from the 80s. First time I saw it was back in like 1998
@@pomponi0 more mid to late 90s. I was 16 in 96.😁
I tried Zima when it returned in 2018. It didn’t blow my mind but it was pretty good at least in my opinion.
The trivial thing I always remember about it is that it was obviously visible as available in the background of the bar on the science-fiction TV show Babylon 5. The creator of the show has said something to the effect that they thought it was an utterly hilarious concept that *this* would still be available a couple of hundred years in the future. Now, I just imagine it's one of the ongoing limited re-releases.
That actually hilarious
OO Hiroshi Tanahashi sighting @ 4:32. Odd to see him with an actual guitar. GO ACE!
I knew that was him! Had my doubts at first since it was so random and unexpected but hell yeah!! 🤘🏽
Can you do a video about the fall of wine coolers that dominated the 70s and 80s? Was once incredibly popular but was largely discarded by companies once legislation passed that raised taxes on wine. This lead directly to the rise of flavored malt beverages as the natural successor to the wine coolers that were being migrated away from.
I remember liking those. I think Bartles and James was the main one we drank.
_Thanks for your support._
I occasionally find B&J bottles on public hunting land. Distinctive (but not as cool, by far, as the Zima bottle lol)
90s they were still around. i think they just got rebranded as boxed wine
Wine coolers did not "dominate" the 70's and 80's. I was there.
@@toomanyaccounts Nope. Wine coolers have fruit juice in them. Boxed wine does not, unless there's been some developments in the boxed wine world in the last 10 years, which is possble.
loved zima as a kid. they brought it back a few years ago. local beer store had a pallet. bought several cases. it was like a time machine. i could drink zima but not hard mikes/smirnof. 2+ feels like broken glass in my stomach. i wish theyd bring this back.🍻
Am I the only person who liked Zima? I really did like the taste, and I would drink it now. 🤷♀️
same.
It was ok, my favorite was Seagram's Golden Wine Cooler.
I liked it too ☺️☺️☺️
I liked it, and unlike most of the commenters, I was 40 when it came out. I never liked beer, so I appreciated something else to drink in its place. Somehow it always reminded me of a gin and tonic in its taste.
You all are more than welcome to my share.
Have you covered Minute Maid soda? Their orange soda was amazing. I think it had OJ in it...?
I don’t know what it is, but Crystal Pepsi evokes the most strong feelings of nostalgia for me. I didn’t particularly like it or care too much about it when it came out. But when I see those colors and that font, it brings me right back to 1992!
Still better then the Pepsi One. I have 🤢to almost 🤮 just thinking about the Pepsi One that was somehow worse then Diet Pepsi with 1 more calorie.
I liked Crystal Pepsi. I'll never forget its taste, and I feel you so much on the strong feelings of nostalgia. 😞
@@ANSWERTHECALLOFJESUSCHRIST as someone who was a mid teenager when they rereleased it. I genuinely enjoyed it and it was just fashionable. I still miss it
Crystal Pepsi was vile. I suspect whatever made Pepsi dark had an effect on the flavor.
Funny. I never got any notifications anybody replied until blackjacks was sent to me. I hate it how TH-cam seems to pick and choose what it will notify you on. Anyway, here's to the memories!
It’s very interesting seeing a beverage basically be a proto version of what is now a really popular drink, and it failing to do what the company wanted it to do. I’m kind of curious how well or poorly it would handle today’s market
I'd laugh if they reissued it today under a completely different name, and it did like REALLY well. Like excise the "Zima" name baggage, don't tell anyone it's the same formula(s) and re-badge it something else as a competitor to Mike's Hard Lemonade, et al. Would anyone ever really know, or care? I mean at some point it's all just flavored booze, right?
They rebooted it for a limited time in 2018. My local area couldn't keep it in stock. The Coors's Brewing Company still owns the trademark and right to it. There was talk before Covid-19 about another limited run but sadly the pandemic killed it.
I've still seen it sold.
I grew up in the 80's and 90's and the way I remember it, you officially lost your man card if you were ever caught drinking a Zima. It was for lily livered limp wristed art students. There's too many of us still around who remember that. The Zima branding makes it a non starter regardless of the drink itself.
@@guysmiley4830 but what if it never released in 90s, and instead it’s first release was late 2010s? This is more what I’m getting at
Need to do a video on California Coolers. They were the first coolers that came out and had real wine until something happened where they had to switch over to making them a malt based beverage. They were never good after the switch
yes! all "wine coolers" are malt now and it sucks. Malt kills my stomach.
Oh is THIS what happened? I though I was remembering wrong.
There's quite a story there. Beer went to war with wine over dwindling market share. In the end, beer won through underhanded politics
i may or may not have drank a zima with a jolly rancher in it in the early 2000's. along with many more smirnoff ice's
Zima will forever be locked in my memory as what I drank during a certain blind date in summer 1997. Dude was not for me (I liked his dog though), I had a boring time, so no more that guy and no more Zima. I was 23 at that time. Now I'd only have Zima if there was nothing else, and if there was lemon or lime to mix in. I'd rather have sparkling mineral water.
Only one subscriber?!! :o
@@SiliconBong 4 now.
You were looking for a bad boy. 😃
@@Bat_Boy LMAO I was looking for a smart boy. I was bored because this guy was kind of dumb.
@@studentdrake y'all subscribing to nothing
I was in my 20s when Zima came out. I didn't like wine or beer because they weren't sweet, and I wasn't willing to spend big money on mixed drinks at a bar. Wine coolers were my first go-to drink, because (as far as I know) they were the first sweet+carbonated+light alcoholic beverage (that wasn't a liqueur) that you could ever buy right off the shelf. When Zima came out, it was much better, and I liked the taste. It was exactly what it set out to be: 7-Up with a malt background and alcohol. Anyway, I'd drink it again if it came out.
Either there are limited releases regularly, or the dozen or so cases of Zima have been sitting at my local beer store for years.
Both possibilities could be true.
It’s probably both
Me and my friends always added in a jolly rancher to improve the taste somewhat.
People may not realize how big Zima is in Japan. There were two guys in Japan around me who were super hardcore Zima drinkers.
One was my roommate who always had a couple crates of Zima in his fridge no matter what. It's ok for fridge to not have food or water, but if it ran out of Zima, all hell would burst loose.
Another guy I knew worked at 7/11 in Japan. He could delay paying his rent, but he had to get his supply of Zima first. He even bragged alot about how he steals Zima from his 7/11 when he has no money, and no one has ever noticed it.
I had zima when they re-released it in 2017, it really does just taste like a watered down sprite with a bit of citrus tartness. It basically was the same thing as the mikes hard lemonades these days, they use the same malt process to make the alcohol, so trying to market to men was a hilariously bad marketing decision in the first place. The Zima myth is crazy haha, they forgot about chemistry 😒
This episode took me back. Thanks for the laughs.
When it first appeared on the market, I tried a ZIMA once. ONCE!
I still have a couple of cases of this stuff in cold storage from the 2017 re-release. It is probably even more undrinkable than it was in 2017... or the 1990s.
Still it is a strong association with pleasant memories of the 20th century. I hope it is produced again.
if you have the cases ill buy it for my birthday.
Why
The way I remember it tasting was seltzer water, the flavor they used in another 90s product, Fruit-A-Burst gum, and low grade vodka. Once in a lifetime is more than enough.
Hahah yeah it did taste like fruit a burst
I unironically love Zima. I wish they would release it again.
Glad to hear that Hiroshi Tanahashi led to the success of Zima. He's truly the GOAT go ace!
Glad to see it confirmed it was him. That was completely unexpected lol
Actually, Zima was tasty. It was easy to drink on a hot day and it actually tasted pretty much like sprite.
EXACTLY!
Bud light lime has to be close
And the buzz was fine.
So funny. It's named by russian word. (Зима Zima=Winter) I'm from russia and i never see this drink :D
@@Dr.Pepper001 because it had a 4% ABV lol
You should definitely do a video on Julia Child. She was so important in bringing French cooking and more over bringing modern cooking technique to the USA.
Yes, coming, but a little down the road
There was a drag queen in Boise who could do the most hilarious Julia Child routine!
I remember when I first moved here to Japan and went into a convenience store and saw Zima! I immediately had to buy it to relive those sweet, sweet junior high days when a friend having a six pack of zima hidden in their bedroom during a sleep over was the height of cool. LOL The sakura flavor is actually not awful. I think some of the success of zima in Japan can also be attributed to a popular type of drink called Chuhi which is similar, has many different brands and comes in seemingly endless flavors but most popular is lemon-lime.
I was going to say those flavors look awesome.
Yeah but Chuhi is better than Zima any day. It's one of those things I miss about Japan is being able to get a seasonal can of Chuhi from the local Yamaya every so often.
@@umachan9286 AGREED!
a friend of mine lived there for a while as a JET, and told us tales of Suntory Strong Zero vending machines by his house. I'm still waiting on my cans of it. he called that brand Gods Own Zima.
@@thh420 strong zero will destroy you. Unless you’re a full fledged alcoholic who loves vomiting and hates your liver , don’t touch it .
0:00 Statistically, half of us who grew up in the 90's are horribly depressed and much of that group is unlikely to feel any nostalgia.
But sure go ahead, nostalgia is the only tool you have when you got nothing else going for your video.
I love the taste of Zima, the bottle is cool looking, and wish it to come back. It had a short comeback a few years ago.
I'm really surprised to hear so many people didn't like it. It was like a less sweet Smirnoff Ice with a more citrusy taste. At all the parties we had, the only people that scoffed at drinking it was dudes afraid to drink a "girly drink" until we showed them the alcohol percentage. I couldn't drink them all the time but they were a fantastic change of pace from Natty and everclear.
It was an unusual taste for them, today? It isn’t remotely that unusual a flavor profile as compared to what people often drink.
I mean Zima was about in line with your average light beer as far as ABV went. Speaking as someone who regularly enjoys a stout or an IPA though it always amuses me when I hear about college dudes thinking that
Mmm... Citrussy...
@@SavageGreywolf Back in those college days options for "powerful" alcoholic beverages were limited to malt liquor or things like Steel Reserve. Being a broke college dude we settled for whatever was cheapest and gave us the most bang for our buck most of the time. Zima had this weird stigma of being a low alcohol content win cooler back then so showing that it was 4.7% was a big deal- so to speak. Also, there were times we were stuck with getting beer from a gas station and back then they couldn't sell beer with percentages above 3.2% in Colorado/Utah.
So Natural Ice and Everclear were the only other beer and liquor at the store? The shelves had only Natural Ice, Everclear and Zima on them?
I loved Zima when they brought it back a few years ago. Oddly enough now that I’m thinking of it again I kind of feel wistful remembering the great summer I had that year, I miss everybody and the experiences I had. I think we associate things with the times we had with them. It’s just funny how seeing a picture of this stuff made me feel.
Smirnoff triple black was one of my favorite drinks. God I could drink cases of that on a hot day
I remember being a kid seeing the zima commercials all the time, thinking I couldn't wait to try it when I got older, only to find out it was long gone. Then I moved to Japan and was shocked to see it was everywhere. I drink it all the time here, its actually pretty good.
I was not old enough to drink when it first came out, but I remember the advertising because it was inescapable. Re: the modern alternative drinks, I once worked in a grocery store that did NOT have a liquor license, who got a whole shipment of Mike's Hard Lemonade without knowing it was alcohol. It was out and on display for maybe a day or two before the error was realized and they sent it back to the distributor. So I can see how there was some confusion about "alternative" drinks. The grocery order person was like I JUST THOUGHT IT WAS FANCY LEMONADE! ...we were a health food store, after all. xD
I actually LIKED Zima. It was a nice change from the nasty regular beer my friends drank. I mean, Natty was nasty, at least Zima tasted better. I didn't drink it to get drunk, I drank it because I liked it. Never got drunk in those days. Didn't need to or want to.
It seemed like something I would have enjoyed if I was the legal drinking age then. But by the time I was legal Zima was already long gone. Also I much prefer malt coolers to regular beer.
There are other beers besides Natural Ice. Try them.
You're drinking for the wrong reasons if you're not doing it to get fucked up
Let's be honest, there are far worst tasting things sitting on the cooler shelves these days.
Never had a Zima, but when I was in my late 20's I did enjoy wine coolers. I loved wine cooler ads featuring the folksy Bartles & James, and the cool rockin' Bruce Willis.
Back in the day I wasn't impressed w/Zima. I was legally able to drink at 19 so going out for a beer was normal. But I did support Frank and Ed. Politically, they would have been just fine in the White House back then and while thinking about it, even more so today 🤣.
I did learn something from this: what the name means.
I love Zima! I bought a ton of it when it was briefly re-released a few years ago.
Hell yeah!
Zima ruled, I'll never forget as a young teen riding my MO'ped with a clanking backpack full of Zima to meet my buddy in the woods and get hammered, man those where the days 🤘
To the 90's 🥂
And snorting coke while drinking Zima.
@@ebogar42 dude, right?
@@SoulforSale It was good with a lot of hard drugs. It was easy on the stomach. Add some skittles and you really have a party. 🤣
Lol, is it even possible to get hammered on a 6 back of zima (answer: no)
I liked Zima. It was crisp with a bit of a tang. It was ahead of its time.
Zima was an outgrowth of the wine cooler fad. In the mid 80s wine coolers were huge. There were "classier" brands like Bartles & James, but for the aspiring underage drinker there were the fine beverages of Mogen David. They (still) make MD 20/20 fortified wine, the hallowed (and cringe inducing) Mad Dog. But during the wine cooler heyday they had myriad flavors of 20/20 Wine Coolers...in TWO LITER BOTTLES. Peach, Berry, etc. In 1986 they cost something like $2.49 a bottle. They were a staple of teen binge drinking in my formative years.
You remember Matilda Bay?
@@munkandbear2818 I can't say that I do, even after looking it up. Here on the left coast of the US about the only "Australian" import we got was Fosters, which of course was/is brewed in Canada.
I was in my teens when Zima came out and everyone was drinking it . I liked it.
target audience
I’m okay with this as long as the beer and Zima cultures are at peace. 😎✌🏻
No you didn't. 😏 You liked the fact that you were drinking it.
@@lilmike2710 So you’re assuming to know what someone else likes or doesn’t like?
@@grahambrown1980 Yes.. I am.
Unless someone does indeed enjoy the taste of flat diet Sprite, cheap grain alcohol and ass.
Zima tastes fine. It ought to be brought back, with all the other weird beer tastes, it is no longer as”out of the ordinary” taste it was when originally released.🤷🏼♂️
I drank some a couple years ago, I think it's still around.
@@artcarrasco9 watching the rest of the video, maybe it was during one of those limited releases.
We were just hanging around drinking when someone mentioned Zima and they said you can get Zima here, so we drank a couple.
@@vinyllpreviews9462 , I don't know where, it's not at Total Wine, and they're all over the US.
You can still get Zima in Japan sometimes. I like it. It tastes good and it doesn't give me a hangover for some reason. There are different flavours too. I wish I saw it around more because I'd rather have it than a beer or something else than has detrimental effects. Zima you just get a buzz, but don't feel bad after.
You’d think with the rise of similar drinks now and nostalgia at its highest rn that they’d bring back Zima with an improved tweaked recipe. If they manage to improve the flavor enough, they would dominate white claws
It did work as an ingredient for Jungle Juice (fruit booze punch made from random ingredients one could find the fridge or parents liquor cabinet.)
HA! We called that Trash Can Punch.
As one of those teenagers of the early-nineties, I can confirm we had people buy it for us for exactly those reasons stated: Clear, didn't smell like booze, and mixed well with just about anything. But oh god, the heartburn...
Yeah, all the sugar and citric acid.
I drank it as teen as well as all my friends. I remember it tasting good until they changed the formula. Once they changed it I remember all of us tasting it and saying nope.
The same period ice beer was all the rage, at least in northern MI...all my teen parties were sponsored by moslom ice
@@dutchybag oh yeah I remember ice beer! Most of the breweries had one... Bud Ice, etc.
"Yo ho ho and a bottle of Zima!" - Eric Andre
Zima was ubiquitous when I was in high school. There was definitely the whole “it doesn’t show up in breathalyzer tests” myth, but I also think it was popular because of its low alcohol content. It didn’t hit an underage drinker the same way normal beer would.
4.7% is around what most beers are. They usually range from around 4.3-6% for your standard beers
Corona has a lower ABV
@@DarkYuydidn’t hit like it, felt more like a 2.5
4.7% isn't really low for malt beverages.
4.7 is higher than most beers you buy at places like Walmart
I tried Zima in the 90's. It tasted like a bitter/sour, watered down 7Up. So, not very good, in other words.
A few years ago I worked at a beer distributor and for some reason Zima was back on the shelves for a limited time and it was FLYING off the shelves it was nuts. I finally got to try it since I was a kid when it came out, it tasted like dusty lemons.
I can't wait to see your video on the fall of bud light due to 1 ill advised ad campaign.
When I heard about this channel I was like I don't know if I really want to watch a bunch of videos about food history but I've watched each episode as it came out so yeah I'm going to subscribe
To be honest the narrator seals of the deal
This is nothing. Check out the regular weird history channel. All the videos have the same narrator! 😀
When I was living in America in the 90s, I now live in Norway, I tried Zima and I loved it! All my friends thought that I was weird for drinking it because they thought it tasted nasty. The other thing. Surge is discontinued in America? It's still a huge hit here in Norway but it's called Urge here. Big hit with the kids and teens.
Surge sometimes comes back for a little bit in America, then it goes away again.
Dude they took surge off the market here because it had a toxic ingredient. I'm not even joking. I forget the name of the chemical. The FDA banned it, and the makers of surge would have had to reformulate.. Instead of going to that expense, they just discontinued it. I'm not making this up. Don't drink that shit.
I remember my first job as a cashier Zima was popular for people who weren't real drinkers, because Zima was like Sprite . Anyone who wanted to drink usually went with something stronger.
Зима-zima means winter in russian
I laughed at people who drank Zima, same as people who drink white claw or other seltzer booze.
@@blaquenoise exactly. Even when i first started drinking, i started on the classics; jugs of wine, beers, cheap liquors, and moved onto more high-end brandies and apple ciders.
idk Zima and other seltzers kinda just feel like "i wanna be an alcoholic but have none of the class that it comes with" it feels like something that teenage edgelords drink.
Like, 'cause if they're a inexperienced woman, a wine cooler or wine works; inexperienced man, just a beer or cider; if they're experienced and want something fruity and hard, they're gonna make or order a mix drink; stereotypically, men would get darker liquors in more pungent mixes (generally whiskey and coke or old fashioned) or a dirty martini; while more experienced women generally throw back fruitier/savory mixes or just know her beer.
Like, i mean, i walk into a classy bar and order a "dirty martini, shaken, keep the pit" it'll look way cooler and classier than "yall got white claw orange?
Me in the early 90's: I'm too young to try Zima.
Me in 2017: Keep that citrus-flavored horse piss crap away from me.
Being too young to have it in it's heyday, luckily I had a chance to have it recently. I think there was a brief resurgence around 2017 or so. I know it's been continually produced in Japan. I managed to get a 6 pack and honestly I liked it. I dunno if it's exactly the same as it was in 90s, but it wasn't bad.