Hires Root Beer

Hires Root Beer is a soft drink which is currently marketed by Dr Pepper/Seven Up, Inc., and shares the title of America's oldest soft drink with Detroit's Vernor's ginger ale. more...

Hires Root Beer was created by Philadelphia pharmacist Charles Elmer Hires on May 16, 1866, who gave it the name root beer rather than herbal tea. It debuted in 1876 at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was sold to the public in bottles in 1893.

Hires Root Beer was promoted as "The Temperance Drink" and "the Greatest Health-Giving Beverage in the World." Hires advertised aggressively, believing "doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing, but nobody else does."

Hires Root Beer Kits, available in the United States from the early 1900s through the 1980s allowed consumers to mix a dry extract with water, sugar and yeast to brew their own root beer. However most consumption was of pre-bottled root beer.

By 1989 it had been acquired by Cadbury-Schweppes, owner of Dr Pepper/Seven Up.

The manufacturer considers it the longest continuously made soft drink in the United States; however, Vernor's ginger ale (currently also owned by Cadbury-Schweppes) also makes that claim.

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