Tang is an American

drink mix A drink mix is a processed-food product, designed to mix usually with water to produce a beverage resembling fruit juice or soda in flavor. Another type of drink mix is represented by products that are mixed into milk. It is traditionally made i ...

brand that was formulated by

General Foods Corporation General Foods Corporation was a company whose direct predecessor was established in the United States by Charles William Post as the Postum Cereal Company in 1895. The company changed its name to "General Foods" in 1929, after several corporate ...

food scientist Food science is the basic science and applied science of food; its scope starts at overlap with agricultural science and nutritional science and leads through the scientific aspects of food safety and food processing, informing the development ...

William A. Mitchell Dr. William A. Mitchell (October 21, 1911 – July 26, 2004) was an American food chemist who, while working for General Foods Corporation between 1941 and 1976, was the key inventor behind Pop Rocks, Tang, Cool Whip, and powdered egg whites. ...

and

chemist A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties. Chemists carefully describe t ...

William Bruce James in 1957, and first marketed in powdered form in 1959. The Tang brand is currently owned in most countries by

Mondelēz International Mondelez International, Inc. ( ), often styled Mondelēz, is an American multinational confectionery, food, holding and beverage and snack food company based in Chicago. Mondelez has an annual revenue of about $26 billion and operates in ...

, a 2012 North American company spun off from

Kraft Foods The second incarnation of Kraft Foods is an American food manufacturing and processing conglomerate, split from Kraft Foods Inc. in 2012 and headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. It became part of Kraft Heinz in 2015. A merger with Heinz, arran ...

Kraft Heinz The Kraft Heinz Company (KHC), commonly known as Kraft Heinz, is an American multinational food company formed by the merger of Kraft Foods and Heinz co-headquartered in Chicago and Pittsburgh. Kraft Heinz is the third-largest food and beverage ...

owns the Tang brand in North America. Sales of Tang were poor until

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

used it on John Glenn's Mercury flight in February 1962, and on subsequent

Gemini Gemini may refer to: Space * Gemini (constellation), one of the constellations of the zodiac ** Gemini in Chinese astronomy * Project Gemini, the second U.S. crewed spaceflight program * Gemini Observatory, consisting of telescopes in the Norther ...

missions. Since then it has been closely associated with the U.S. human spaceflight program, which created the misconception that Tang was invented for the space program.

History

General Foods Corporation food scientist William A. Mitchell and chemist William Bruce James formulated and trademarked Tang in 1957. Tang entered test markets in 1958 and was available to the public beginning in 1959. Tang was used by early NASA crewed space flights. In 1962, when Mercury astronaut John Glenn conducted eating experiments in orbit, Tang was selected for the menu; it was also used during some Gemini flights, and has also been carried aboard numerous space shuttle missions. Although many soda companies sent specially designed canned drinks into space with the crew of

STS-51-F STS-51-F (also known as Spacelab 2) was the 19th flight of NASA's Space Shuttle program and the eighth flight of Space Shuttle ''Challenger''. It launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on July 29, 1985, and landed eight days later on Aug ...

, the crew preferred to use Tang, as it could be mixed into existing water containers easily. In 2013, former NASA astronaut

Buzz Aldrin Buzz Aldrin (; born Edwin Eugene Aldrin Jr.; January 20, 1930) is an American former astronaut, engineer and fighter pilot. He made three spacewalks as pilot of the 1966 Gemini 12 mission. As the Lunar Module ''Eagle'' pilot on the 1969 A ...

said, "Tang sucks". The creator of Tang, William A. Mitchell, also invented Pop Rocks,

Cool Whip Cool Whip is an American brand of imitation whipped cream, referred to as a '' whipped topping'' by its manufacturer, Kraft Heinz. It is used in North America as a topping for desserts, and in some no-bake pie recipes as a convenience food or ing ...

, a form of instant-set

Jell-O Jell-O is an American brand offering a variety of powdered gelatin dessert (fruit-flavored gels/jellies), pudding, and no-bake cream pie mixes. The original gelatin dessert ( genericized as jello) is the signature of the brand. "Jell-O" is a ...

, and other convenience foods. Chemist William Bruce James also invented several Jell-O flavors. Tang is noted for its advertising in the 1990s and early 2000s which featured the

orangutan Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genu ...

as a recurring theme.

Nutritional facts

Tang is sold in powdered and liquid-

concentrate A concentrate is a form of substance that has had the majority of its base component (in the case of a liquid: the solvent) removed. Typically, this will be the removal of water from a solution or suspension, such as the removal of water from ...

form. The suggested serving size is two

tablespoon A tablespoon (tbsp. , Tbsp. , Tb. , or T.) is a large spoon. In many English-speaking regions, the term now refers to a large spoon used for serving; however, in some regions, it is the largest type of spoon used for eating. By extension, the ter ...

s, or 31 grams of powdered Original Orange flavored Tang per of water. A single suggested serving of Tang contains of sugar (representing 94% of the product's dry weight); 10% RDA of carbohydrates; 100% RDA of

vitamin C Vitamin C (also known as ascorbic acid and ascorbate) is a water-soluble vitamin found in citrus and other fruits and vegetables, also sold as a dietary supplement and as a topical 'serum' ingredient to treat melasma (dark pigment spots) ...

; 6% RDA of

calcium Calcium is a chemical element with the symbol Ca and atomic number 20. As an alkaline earth metal, calcium is a reactive metal that forms a dark oxide-nitride layer when exposed to air. Its physical and chemical properties are most similar t ...

and has a total of 120

calories The calorie is a unit of energy. For historical reasons, two main definitions of "calorie" are in wide use. The large calorie, food calorie, or kilogram calorie was originally defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of o ...

(500 kJ).

Other versions

In 2007, Kraft introduced a new version of Tang which replaced half of the sugar with artificial sweeteners. The new packaging advertises "1/2 the sugar of 100% juice". The artificial sweeteners used in the new formulation are sucralose, acesulfame potassium and

neotame Neotame, also known by the trade name Newtame, is a non-caloric artificial sweetener and aspartame analog by NutraSweet. By mass, it is 8000 times sweeter than sucrose. It has no notable off-flavors when compared to sucrose. It enhances origina ...

. The new formula is more concentrated and distributed in smaller containers, with a () making . According to the preparation instructions on the 20 oz Tang orange drink mix, 2 level tablespoons of the Tang drink mix can be combined with 1 cup or 8 fl oz of cold water for 1 serving of the beverage. In 2009, another version of Tang emerged in containers making only . Orange flavored Tang contributes to most sales worldwide; however, there are a wide range of flavors of Tang offered globally. Some of these flavors include grape, lemon, mango, pineapple, and many more.

Sales

Tang is sold in about thirty-five countries and is available in a variety of flavors depending on location. The top three markets for Tang around the world are Brazil, Argentina, and the Philippines. In the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...

, more than half of Tang's annual sales occur in just six weeks around Ramadan. In June 2011, Kraft Foods announced that Tang has become its twelfth billion-dollar brand, with global sales nearly doubling since 2006. The brand in 2010 controlled a category-best 15.6% of the international powder concentrate market although, like other highly processed or sweetened beverages, demand in developed economies has stagnated or fallen in line with consumers increasing preference for lower calorie drinks. In 2018, Tang's manufacturer Mondelez reported a drop in sales following the introduction of tax on calorific sweetened beverages in the Philippines.

References

External links

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TANG 2017 Fact Sheet PDF
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tang (Drink) Products introduced in 1957 American drinks Mondelez International brands Powdered drink mixes