Juicy Fruit is an American brand of

chewing gum Chewing gum is a soft, cohesive substance designed to be chewed without being swallowed. Modern chewing gum is composed of gum base, sweeteners, softeners/ plasticizers, flavors, colors, and, typically, a hard or powdered polyol coating. Its t ...

made by the

Wrigley Company The Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company, known as the Wrigley Company, is an American multinational chewing gum (Wrigley's gum) company, based in the Global Innovation Center (GIC) in Goose Island, Chicago, Illinois. Wrigley's is wholly owned by Mars, I ...

, a U.S. company that since 2008 has been a subsidiary of the privately held

Mars, Incorporated Mars, Incorporated is an American multinational manufacturer of confectionery, pet food, and other food products and a provider of animal care services, with US$40 billion in annual sales in 2021. Mars was ranked as the fourth-largest pri ...

. It was introduced in 1893, and in the 21st century the brand name is recognized by 99 percent of Americans, with total sales in 2002 of 153 million units.

Description

Flavor

Wrigley's Juicy Fruit Starburst Fruit Punch Gum

Which

fruit In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants that is formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which flowering plants (also known as angiosperms) disseminate their seeds. Edible fruits in partic ...

serves as the model for its flavor is kept vague in advertising, though in 2003, advertising agency

BBDO BBDO is a worldwide advertising agency network, with its headquarters in New York City. The agency originated in 1891 with the George Batten Company, and in 1928, through a merger with Barton, Durstine & Osborn (BDO), the agency became Batten, B ...

characterized it as a combination of

banana A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large herbaceous flowering plants in the genus ''Musa''. In some countries, bananas used for cooking may be called "plantains", disting ...

and

pineapple The pineapple (''Ananas comosus'') is a tropical plant with an edible fruit; it is the most economically significant plant in the family Bromeliaceae. The pineapple is indigenous to South America, where it has been cultivated for many centuri ...

, and some people say it resembles

jackfruit The jackfruit (''Artocarpus heterophyllus''), also known as jack tree, is a species of tree in the fig, mulberry, and breadfruit family ( Moraceae). Its origin is in the region between the Western Ghats of southern India, all of Bangladesh, ...

. According to two books in the '' Imponderables'' series,

peach The peach (''Prunus persica'') is a deciduous tree first domesticated and cultivated in Zhejiang province of Eastern China. It bears edible juicy fruits with various characteristics, most called peaches and others (the glossy-skinned, n ...

is one crucial flavor among many others. It is likely that the chemical used for flavoring is

isoamyl acetate Isoamyl acetate, also known as isopentyl acetate, is an organic compound that is the ester formed from isoamyl alcohol and acetic acid, with the molecular formula C7H14O2.It is a colorless liquid that is only slightly soluble in water, but very ...

(sometimes known as ''banana oil''), a

carboxylic ester In chemistry, an ester is a compound derived from an oxoacid (organic or inorganic) in which at least one hydroxyl group () is replaced by an alkoxy group (), as in the substitution reaction of a carboxylic acid and an alcohol. Glycerides are ...

, which is also found in jackfruit.

Consumer demographics

The average age of the typical Juicy Fruit consumer is under 20, with three to eleven year olds making up the heart of the business; those twenty years old and over account for 40% of the purchases.

Sean Payton Sean, also spelled Seán or Séan in Irish English, is a male given name of Irish origin. It comes from the Irish versions of the Biblical Hebrew name ''Yohanan'' (), Seán ( anglicized as '' Shaun/Shawn/ Shon'') and Séan (Ulster variant; angli ...

, former head coach of the

New Orleans Saints The New Orleans Saints are a professional American football team based in New Orleans. The Saints compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) South division. Since 1975, the te ...

of the NFL, is well known for requesting Juicy Fruit in the middle of games.

Ingredients

Juicy Fruit gum consists mostly of sugar contained in a synthetic gum base. Other ingredients include corn syrup and dextrose as bulk agents and natural sweeteners, natural and artificial flavorings, glycerol and lecithin as softening agents, aspartame (NutraSweet) and acesulfame K as artificial sweeteners, Yellow Lake 5 as a coloring and BHT as a preservative. In the UK, the ingredients used are as listed:

Sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or do ...

, Gum Base, Glucose Syrup,

Flavourings A flavoring (or flavouring), also known as flavor (or flavour) or flavorant, is a food additive used to improve the taste or smell of food. It changes the perceptual impression of food as determined primarily by the chemoreceptors of the gust ...

Humectant A humectant is a hygroscopic (water-absorbing) substance used to keep things moist. They are used in many products, including food, cosmetics, medicines and pesticides. When used as a food additive, a humectant has the effect of keeping moistur ...

(

Glycerol Glycerol (), also called glycerine in British English and glycerin in American English, is a simple triol compound. It is a colorless, odorless, viscous liquid that is sweet-tasting and non-toxic. The glycerol backbone is found in lipids known ...

Emulsifier An emulsion is a mixture of two or more liquids that are normally immiscible (unmixable or unblendable) owing to liquid-liquid phase separation. Emulsions are part of a more general class of two-phase systems of matter called colloids. Althoug ...

( Soybean Lecithin), Sweeteners ( Acesulfame K,

Sucralose Sucralose is an artificial sweetener and sugar substitute. The majority of ingested sucralose is not broken down by the body, so it is noncaloric. In the European Union, it is also known under the E number E955. It is produced by chlorination ...

), Antioxidant ( BHA).

History

When William Wrigley Jr. started his new business in Chicago, he began by selling his father's Scouring Soap, which he would entice customers to purchase by adding a free gift of baking powder. The baking powder offered ended up being far more popular than the Scouring Soap, so he switched to selling the baking powder instead. In 1892, Wrigley Jr. decided to give his baking powder customers a free gift, this time, attaching a few sticks of chewing gum to the box of baking powder. The chewing gum was far more popular than the baking powder, so Wrigley Jr. again switched his business this time to chewing gum. In 1893, Wrigley Jr. introduced a new flavor of gum, Juicy Fruit, which helped the Wrigley Company to become the most popular and successful chewing gum company in the world. Juicy Fruit 1946

When the brand first entered the market, it was packaged simply, with a plain wrapper and "JUICY FRUIT" in red, thin block letters. In 1914, Wrigley changed it to thin vertical white and green stripes with "Wrigley's Juicy Fruit Chewing Gum" centered in a stylized

Maltese Cross The Maltese cross is a cross symbol, consisting of four " V" or arrowhead shaped concave quadrilaterals converging at a central vertex at right angles, two tips pointing outward symmetrically. It is a heraldic cross variant which develope ...

emblem An emblem is an abstract or representational pictorial image that represents a concept, like a moral truth, or an allegory, or a person, like a king or saint. Emblems vs. symbols Although the words ''emblem'' and '' symbol'' are often use ...

with a black background.Juicy Fruit Packaging
, from Wrigley's website Juicy Fruit was taken off of the civilian market temporarily during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

because of ingredient shortages and the demand for the gum to be included in

C-ration The C-Ration, or Field Ration, Type C, was a prepared and canned wet combat ration intended to be issued to U.S. military land forces when fresh food (A-ration) or packaged unprepared food (B-ration) prepared in mess halls or field kitchens was ...

s. When the gum was reintroduced to the general public after World War II ended, the striped packaging was replaced by one with a bright yellow background and "Juicy Fruit" bracketed between two stylized

chevron Chevron (often relating to V-shaped patterns) may refer to: Science and technology * Chevron (aerospace), sawtooth patterns on some jet engines * Chevron (anatomy), a bone * '' Eulithis testata'', a moth * Chevron (geology), a fold in rock la ...

s, the latter a motif meant to echo the "Wrigley arrow" element used for Wrigley's Spearmint since 1893. The bright yellow background remained into the 21st century, with variations since 2002 turning the arrowhead like chevrons into the corners of an elongated smile under the brand name. Juicy Fruit is still widely popular today. In 2003 in the United States, Wrigley's replaced some of the sugar in Juicy Fruit with two

artificial sweetener A sugar substitute is a food additive that provides a sweetness like that of sugar while containing significantly less food energy than sugar-based sweeteners, making it a zero-calorie () or low-calorie sweetener. Artificial sweeteners may b ...

aspartame Aspartame is an artificial non- saccharide sweetener 200 times sweeter than sucrose and is commonly used as a sugar substitute in foods and beverages. It is a methyl ester of the aspartic acid/phenylalanine dipeptide with the trade na ...

and Acesulfame potassium. "

Grapefruit—Juicy Fruit "Grapefruit—Juicy Fruit" is a song written and performed by American singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett. It was first released on his 1973 album ''A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean'' and was his third single from that album. The single rea ...

" is a song written and performed by well-known popular music singer songwriter

Jimmy Buffett James William Buffett (born December 25, 1946) is an American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and businessman. He is best known for his music, which often portrays an "island escapism" lifestyle. Together with his Coral Reefer Band, Buffe ...

. It was first released on his 1973 album ''

A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean ''A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean'' is the third studio album by American singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett. It was released on June 4, 1973, as his first album for Dunhill. It was the first album to feature Buffett's trademark mustache. ...

'' and was his third single from that album. The single reached #23 on the Billboard Easy Listening chart in September 1973. It also features in the 1983 song " Juicy Fruit" by

Mtume Mtume (pronounced ''em-tu-may'') was an American funk and soul group that rose to prominence during the early 1980s and had several R&B hits during its career. Its founder, former percussionist James Mtume, previously played and toured with ...

. Separately, a Juicy Fruit jingle that ended with the lyrics—"the taste, the taste, the taste is gonna move ya!"—was widely recognizable in TV advertisements throughout the 1980s.

References

External links

Juicy Fruit official Facebook page Juicy Fruit on Wrigley.com
{{Wrigley Wrigley Company brands Chewing gum Products introduced in 1893 World's Columbian Exposition de:The Wrigley Company#Juicy Fruit