The A-Treat Bottling Company is a beverage company, with headquarters in Allentown

Allentown, Pennsylvania

Allentown is a city located in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is Pennsylvania's third most populous city, after Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and the 215th largest city in the United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 118,032 and is currently...

, Lehigh County

Lehigh County, Pennsylvania

-Climate:Most of the county's climate is considered to fall in the humid continental climate zone. Summers are typically hot and muggy, fall and spring are generally mild, and winter is cold. Precipitation is almost uniformly distributed throughout the year....

, Pennsylvania in the United States, that manufactures and bottles the regionally-popular A-Treat brand of carbonated soft drink

Soft drink

A soft drink is a non-alcoholic beverage that typically contains water , a sweetener, and a flavoring agent...

s.

History

A-Treat was formally established in 1918 by Joseph C. and John L. ("Jack") Egizio. Their father, Gioacchino Egizio, started a beverage business in the family home in the 600 block of Front Street in Allentown, and later built a small manufacturing facility behind the home. Their mother, Vincenza Munjone, also came from a family involved in the beverage business in Allentown. In 1932, the Egizio brothers moved the business to Union Boulevard in East Allentown, where it remains to this day. Joseph C. Egizio served as the board chairman of A-Treat Bottling Co. until retiring in 1989. He died in 2000, at the age of 96. John L. Egizio, who had started working at the company at the age of 13 delivering sodas on his bicycle, served as vice president and co-owner until his death in 1990.

In 1991, the company was the subject of regional news coverage when a smear campaign

Smear campaign

A smear campaign, smear tactic or simply smear is a metaphor for activity that can harm an individual or group's reputation by conflation with a stigmatized group...

 was launched against A-Treat as it tried to sell its sodas in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. The campaign, which targeted African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

s, claimed that certain brands of carbonated beverages - including those produced by A-Treat - were actually manufactured by the Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...

 and contained stimulants that would "sterilize the black man." Investigations by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and New York City's Department of Health found the claims to be unsubstantiated and untrue. (See also: Tropical Fantasy

Tropical Fantasy

Tropical Fantasy is an inexpensive soft-drink, originally from Brooklyn, New York. Its low price of 49¢ per 21-ounce bottle led to its success in the 1990s. Tropical Fantasy was initially popular in inner city areas, especially those with dense African-American and Hispanic populations...

)

Products

The company formerly distinguished itself by producing sodas in the traditional manner (e.g., using essential oil

Essential oil

An essential oil is a concentrated hydrophobic liquid containing volatile aroma compounds from plants. Essential oils are also known as volatile oils, ethereal oils or aetherolea, or simply as the "oil of" the plant from which they were extracted, such as oil of clove...

s and cane sugar, rather than extract

Extract

An extract is a substance made by extracting a part of a raw material, often by using a solvent such as ethanol or water. Extracts may be sold as tinctures or in powder form....

s and high fructose corn syrup

High fructose corn syrup

High-fructose corn syrup  — also called glucose-fructose syrup in the UK, glucose/fructose in Canada, and high-fructose maize syrup in other countries — comprises any of a group of corn syrups that has undergone enzymatic processing to convert some of its glucose into fructose to produce...

). Today, the company uses both cane sugar syrup and high fructose corn syrup. A-Treat produces soft drinks in at least sixteen different flavors, including Big Blue (Blue Raspberry), Birch Beer

Birch beer

Birch beer is a carbonated soft drink made from herbal extracts, usually from birch bark. It has a taste similar to root beer. Various types of birch beer are available, distinguished by color. The color depends on the species of birch tree from which the sap is extracted...

, Black Cherry, Champagne Kola, Cola

Cola

Cola is a carbonated beverage that was typically flavored by the kola nut as well as vanilla and other flavorings, however, some colas are now flavored artificially. It became popular worldwide after druggist John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola in 1886...

, Cream soda

Cream soda

Cream soda is a sweet carbonated soft drink, often flavored with vanilla.-History and development:A recipe for cream soda—written by E.M. Sheldon and published in Michigan Farmer in 1852—called for water, cream of tartar, Epsom salts, sugar, tartaric acid, egg, and milk, to be mixed together, then...

, Fruit Punch, two kinds of Ginger Ale

Ginger ale

Ginger ale is a carbonated soft drink flavored with ginger. Dr. Thomas Cantrell, an American apothecary and surgeon, claimed to have invented ginger ale and marketed it with beverage manufacturer Grattan and Company. Grattan embossed the slogan "The Original Makers of Ginger Ale" on its bottles...

 (Pale Dry and Golden, formerly Peppery Golden), Grape

Grape

A grape is a non-climacteric fruit, specifically a berry, that grows on the perennial and deciduous woody vines of the genus Vitis. Grapes can be eaten raw or they can be used for making jam, juice, jelly, vinegar, wine, grape seed extracts, raisins, molasses and grape seed oil. Grapes are also...

, Grapefruit

Grapefruit

The grapefruit , is a subtropical citrus tree known for its sour fruit, an 18th-century hybrid first bred in Barbados. When found, it was named the "forbidden fruit"; it has also been misidentified with the pomelo or shaddock , one of the parents of this hybrid, the other being sweet orange The...

, White Birch Beer, Pineapple

Pineapple

Pineapple is the common name for a tropical plant and its edible fruit, which is actually a multiple fruit consisting of coalesced berries. It was given the name pineapple due to its resemblance to a pine cone. The pineapple is by far the most economically important plant in the Bromeliaceae...

, Sarsaparilla

Sarsaparilla

is a perennial trailing vine with prickly stems that is native to Central America. Common names include Sarsaparilla , Honduran Sarsaparilla, and Jamaican Sarsaparilla...

, two kinds of Orange

Orange (fruit)

An orange—specifically, the sweet orange—is the citrus Citrus × sinensis and its fruit. It is the most commonly grown tree fruit in the world....

 (regular and Orange Dry), Lime (formerly Tom Collins Mixer), Tonic Water (formerly Quinine Water), Strawberry, Peach, Treat-up, and Root Beer

Root beer

Root beer is a carbonated, sweetened beverage, originally made using the root of a sassafras plant as the primary flavor. Root beer, popularized in North America, comes in two forms: alcoholic and soft drink. The historical root beer was analogous to small beer in that the process provided a drink...

. Most, if not all, of these flavors are also produced in a diet formulation. A-Treat Birch Beer and Sarsaparilla are rated highly by connoisseurs of these types of beverages.

Distribution

A-Treat beverages have limited distribution throughout Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

, Maryland

Maryland

Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

, New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

, and as far away as Bermuda

Bermuda

Bermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. It is about south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and northeast of Miami, Florida...

but only large-scale distributors tend to carry the less ordinary flavors. However, all flavors can be ordered online at http://www.a-treat.com.

External links

• A-Treat website