Wait, why is Dr Pepper so popular now?

Dr Pepper is, arguably, a weird drink. The name alone raises an eyebrow: Is it medicinal? Is it spicy? Is it similar to Coca-Cola, the most famous dark-brown soda in the world? Who is this eponymous doctor anyway? The label on the can claims it’s an “authentic blend” of 23 flavors but doesn’t clarify what a single one is. When I take a sip, I mostly get cherry with undertones of amaretto and licorice, and maybe the barest hint of cough medicine. With another sip, I second-guess myself. Drinking it only leaves me with more questions.

You’d expect such a beverage to be niche, an acquired taste one orders from a specialty shop, not found in millions of homes and major fast food chains. But what’s even weirder than Dr Pepper’s flavor is that we’re living through a Dr Pepper renaissance. This year, it tied Pepsi — the regular version, not diet — as the second bestselling soda in the US behind Coke, according to data from Beverage Digest. Almost a quarter of American adults now drink it, a recent survey from consumer research firm CivicScience showed. That’s a big jump from 2020, when only about 16 percent of the adult population was consuming Dr Pepper regularly.

It’s a sign that there’s never been a better time to be an unusual-tasting beverage. The internet’s current obsession, after all, is the Oreo Coke Zero, which is either disgusting or decadent depending on who you ask. A few years ago, Coca-Cola released a limited-edition flavor called Starlight that was supposed to taste like “space” (more like “minty cotton candy,” according to Food Network); the same year, Pepsi unveiled a trio of s’mores flavored colas intended to be mixed together. That’s not to mention the millions of craft soda brands that have popped up in recent years, infused with rarer flavors like banana cream or blood orange with a hint of jalapeño. 

To be sure, we’re still living in Coca-Cola’s world. One-third of Americans drink regular Coke, which commands about 19 percent of soft drink sales, while other soft drinks scrabble for a distant second place at around 8 percent of the market. But both Coke and Pepsi have a slightly smaller market share today than they did in 2020, while Dr Pepper’s has ticked up. Asking someone if they prefer Coke or Pepsi — two drinks that some see as interchangeable — feels outdated now. People crave a wider range of fizzy drinks.

“The amount of products available to consumers now is almost mind-boggling,” says Duane Stanford, editor and publisher of Beverage Digest. “Consumers across the board like to try new things, like to experiment. Young consumers like to share their discoveries on social media.” The simple fact that Dr Pepper isn’t Coke or Pepsi, in other words, might be exactly what’s drawing new fans.

How a small soda brand survived a cutthroat industry

Just like Coke and Pepsi, Dr Pepper was invented by a pharmacist in the late 1800s, actually predating the famous colas. Back then, the pharmacy was a likely place to find a soda fountain: People have long thought carbonated water could heal illnesses or give someone extra strength. But plain carbonated water was boring, so pharmacists would mix in a variety of fruity syrups for customers much like a barista might make a custom coffee order today, according to Tristan Donovan, author of Fizz: How Soda Shook Up the World. During World War II, Dr Pepper ads even argued that people should strive to drink the soda three times a day to keep up their energy. In 2015, a 104-year-old woman in Texas claimed that this exact regimen was part of her secret to longevity.

According to the Dr Pepper Museum, pharmacist Charles Alderton liked the smell of the combination of sweet syrups used in the Waco, Texas, drugstore where he worked, and tinkered around until he had created a soda that tasted like the pharmacy smelled. The result is the ineffable potpourri of flavors known as Dr Pepper. (As to why it’s called that, the company cites an apocryphal tale that the pharmacy’s owner named it after the father of the woman he loved, but the museum doubts this is true.)

Dr Pepper pretty quickly enjoyed a stronghold of fans in its home state of Texas and surrounding states, but by the mid-20th century, it was far smaller than Coca-Cola and Pepsi. Ironically, the soda thrived exactly because it was unusual. The two cola giants usually required their bottling plants to sign exclusivity agreements forbidding bottling for any rival cola companies. When a court ruled in 1963 that Dr Pepper wasn’t a cola — it didn’t contain any kola nuts — it gave the green light for the company to use much of the same distribution system that Coca-Cola and Pepsi had already set up. To this day, big restaurant chains often carry only Coke or Pepsi, depending on which company they struck a deal with: McDonald’s is Coke territory, while Taco Bell is team Pepsi. Dr Pepper, though, can coexist with both at restaurant soda fountains.

“The majority of Dr Pepper is actually distributed by Coke and Pepsi bottlers in the US,” says Stanford. “So they’ve gotten really good distribution, and they’ve gotten good awareness as a result of that.”

In 1986, Coca-Cola tried to buy Dr Pepper but was blocked by the FTC. Today, the brand is part of Keurig Dr Pepper, whose portfolio includes the popular Keurig coffeemaker as well as beverages like 7Up, Snapple, Schweppes, and A&W. 

The church of Doc P worships its strangeness

To dedicated fans of Dr Pepper, the fact that it’s the underdog is a plus, an alternative to the Coke-or-Pepsi binary. Donovan likens it to voting for “the third presidential candidate” of a two-party soda system. “I don’t think it’s ever going to be the soda that takes over the world, but it has carved out a good niche for itself,” he says.

Maybe because it doesn’t have quite the cultural or economic footprint of Coke and Pepsi, Dr Pepper fans tend to be hyperbolic when extolling its virtues: It’s the best soda, bar none, say some. Nonbelievers are merely philistines, others explain; true connoisseurs (and Texans in general) have always understood the artful enigma of the beverage. Its adherents may be more devoted; the Dr Pepper subreddit has more members than Coke’s or Pepsi’s. It also has at least one famous superfan: the writer John Green, who argues that the invention of the soda was groundbreaking because it was a “flavor profile that had no analog in the real world.” As in, it wasn’t a lemon-flavored fizzy drink, but a unique amalgamation of artificial flavors.

Dissecting its unconventional flavor is fodder for endless discussion among fans. Some sources claim Dr Pepper is a concoction of multiple fruit flavors (even tomato), its sweetness tempered by spices and herbs like nutmeg, juniper, clove, and ginger. One comment on a Reddit post describes the taste as that of “a sexy battery.” You’ll also find some people claiming that pepper is one of the 23 flavors, though it doesn’t taste remotely peppery to me. (The brand did roll out a limited-edition drink last year called Dr Pepper Hot Take that was intended to be spicy.)

There has never before been a time when humans have had so much choice in how to quench their thirst. The grocery aisles have become almost paralyzing with beverage options. There’s flavored water, flavored sparkling water, hard seltzers, and prebiotic sodas, just to name a few relatively recent trends. 

This constant churn of novelty is partly driven by the engine of social media, helping people discover ways to eat and drink, or at least watch other people eat and drink. Offbeat flavor combinations are in, which is a win for Dr Pepper. The brand has leaned into it by recently releasing a head-scratching coconut-lime-flavored creamer with Coffee-Mate meant to be mixed with the beverage, a response to the “dirty soda” Tiktok trend that typically mixes a soda with flavored syrup and coffee creamer. The creamer has been a particular hit in Utah, where dirty sodas have long been popular, and have lately become more widely known thanks to Hulu’s popular reality show The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, as the nondrinking cast makes soda a lifestyle. Another TikTok meme involves people ordering Dr Pepper with pickles at drive-thrus for an extra pucker. Like other major soda brands, Dr Pepper has also rolled out several flavor variants in the last few years, including strawberries and cream, which was a big driver of the 12.7 percent bump in sales the brand enjoyed in its first quarter last year.

Its weirdness has become its strength. According to a recent report from Tracksuit, which measures brand sentiment, Dr Pepper was more often thought of as “unique” and “different” among the 18- to 34-year-old demographic, while distinct keywords associated with Pepsi included “okay” and “traditional.”

A spokesperson for Keurig Dr Pepper told Vox in an email that its soda is so successful because it provides a “one-of-a-kind treat,” largely thanks to the “original 23 flavor recipe that has defined its unique, indulgent taste.” The company did not answer Vox’s question on what, exactly, the soda is supposed to taste like But that’s not surprising – it owes so much of its allure and recent boost in popularity to the fact that it isn’t easily categorizable. After all, when you think about it, what is Coke or Pepsi supposed to taste like? A cola is commonly described as a sweet, caramel-y drink with notes of vanilla, cinnamon, and even citrus, but it’s pretty unusual. It’s just that colas are so ubiquitous, so ingrained into our taste buds, that we now unquestioningly describe other things as being Coke-flavored. 

Dr Pepper hasn’t reached that point of cultural saturation yet. You can taste it and still think, “What is that?”