A brief history of Tab, the iconic diet soda that’s headed to the graveyard

Fast Company ^ | 11/30/20 | Jeffrey Miller

[DallasBiff]

From the beginning, Tab’s story has been one of perseverance. The brand survived initial low sales, the artificial sweetener scares of the 1960s and 1970s, lukewarm enthusiasm for the product at the corporate level and intermittent consumer availability to become—for a brief period—the most popular diet soda in America. Then, of course, Diet Coke came along.

While it never regained its lofty status as the top diet soda, loyal Tab fans kept the brand alive.

[DallasBiff]

My experience with TAB. My mother bought it almost religiously, and I as a pre-teen kid and it tasted horrible, and then I said to her, "Why can't you buy regular Coaa-Cola"

Then in a modern Klaus Schwabian way, she stated, "You will drink TAB and like it, case closed."

God bless my passed Mother, but I will never understand her obsession with TAB in the 70's.

Mods pull if you wish.

[kosciusko51]

I didn’t realize it was still around.

[dfwgator]

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

My grandmother was the same. I used to drink it with her but I didn’t really like it.

[Mermaid Girl]

Oh man, memories of the 70s are just swarming in. Nothing as vom-inducing in me as that acrid taste of whatever it was that was “Just one calorie” and a warm tuna salad sandwich pulled from the depths of my Scooby Doo lunch box. Sometimes paired with a small pack of Fritos, or Chee-Tohs.

I was never a big soda drinker because of it. But then diet Coke came along and I was hooked, not sure why. It tasted better than Tab, that was for dang sure.

[billorites]

Vile saccharine swill.

[metmom]

I tried it and didn’t care for it in the least.

I never knew what people saw in it.

Same for Mountain Dew. Nasty taste.

[Dr. Sivana]

My dad drank the saccharin-based Diet Rite. It tasted just as nasty. I actually drank Tab a bit in the ‘80s, when I could get it in those great leaded glass heavy refillable bottles in Chicago. I liked the Tab commercial with Willie Mays. “Tab, for beautiful people”.

[dfwgator]

I used to drink Fresca back in the day.

[Trump20162020]

I saw Diet Rite at the grocery store yesterday, I was surprised they still make/sell it.

[Secret Agent Man]

Tab was the perfect creation to get people with working tastebuds to stop drinking soda.

[EvilCapitalist]

You think Tab is bad, you should try Moxie.

[peggybac]

That stuff was nasty. Even mixing it with rum didn’t take the horrible taste away.

[Jamestown1630]

People who were watching their weight drank it. I don’t think we had Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi yet.

Once i discovered Diet Pepsi, I couldn’t drink ‘real’ Pepsi anymore. Too sweet.

(Regular Pepsi is still good for ice cream floats, though.)

[virgil]

I always thought ow Diet Rite as diet RC. We drank RC because it was cheaper than Coke and Bubble-up because it was cheaper than 7-Up.

[caww]

I stick to the standard Coke - all the others are imitations IMO. BTW went grocery shopping and the difference in cold when I went in and came out was apparent because of the wind picking up. Just a taste of what’s coming.

[Angelino97]

In the 1980s I had a media job in a Manhattan skyscraper. Most of the women office workers drank TAB.

I only drank Diet Coke because TAB, with its pink can and popularity with women, seemed effeminate.

[Burma Jones]

My SIL still drinks it to this day. I thought she was the only one left.

[central_va]

A frozen margarita is an adult Slurpee.

[dfwgator]

I remember the Tab glass....

That should have been the first clue it was marketed for women.