Limited Edition Foods

Today’s post is about the Championship Red bottles in the Limited Edition Michael Jordan Gatorade bottle set. The Championship Red colored/flavored ones in the set have the 5 of 6 and 6 of 6 label designs. The theme of the Gold ones are Forever. Read about bottles 1 and 2 (Championship Blue) here and bottles 3 and 4 (Championship Gold) here.

The last two bottles in the Michael Jordan set of Gatorade bottles are the Championship Red flavor. This flavor is a just plain Berry and not a flavor blend like the other two flavors in the set. This flavor is pretty good in at least being very berry. It is also not extremely sweet seeming, but it still is a little on the sweeter side than the Championship Gold/Citrus Orange flavor.

The label of the bottle that is 5 of 6 in the series has an image of Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen as Chicago Bulls players. The text on the label talks about him turning to Gatorade to stay hydrated in one of his most memorable performances playing with the flu and scoring 38 points to help Bulls win in Game 5 of the 1997 NBA Finals. It is part of the Forever theme in that this is one of the things he is expected to be most remembered for.

The label of the 6 of 6 bottle has an image of Jordan going up for a dunk. This is my favorite bottle because part of the text talks about him retiring from the NBA to try his hand a AA baseball and that is my favorite sport despite being a Jordan fan anyways. The text also says that he will be remembered as the greatest basketball player of all time, but that seems like a biased statement. Who knows the greatest player to date might be discovered next year and I am sure there are other just as great players at least in some people’s opinions. Anyways it is a cool collection of Gatorade bottles nonetheless.

Today’s post is about the Championship Gold bottles in the Limited Edition Michael Jordan Gatorade bottle set. The Championship Gold colored/flavored ones in the set have 3 of 6 and 4 of 6 label designs. The theme of the Gold ones are Now. Read about bottles 1 and 2 here. I will post about bottles 5 and 6 tomorrow.

The second two bottles in the Michael Jordan set of Gatorade bottles are the Championship Gold flavor. This flavor is a Citrus Orange blend. It is more of a tangerine orange taste than just plain orange. I am also surprised that it is not too sweet of a flavor like pretty much all Gatorade flavors are in my opinion. This is one flavor I can actually stand to drink more than a few sips of without majorly diluting it with water. Perhaps it is the tartness of the citrus flavor that balances out the super sweetness that Gatorade seems to usually have.

The label of the bottle that is 3 of 6 in the series has an image of a person on a motorcycle. The label talks about Jordan’s launching of Michael Jordan Motorsports and the success the team has already had. Thus I believe the image is not of Michael Jordan, but actually one of the people on the Michael Jordan Motorsports team, but I suppose I could be wrong.

The label of the 4 of 6 bottle has an image of recent portrait style image of Michael Jordan. The label talks about how he now leads the Jordan Brand and is a part owner of the Charlotte Bobcats.

Today I went to the grocery store to get some grape tomatoes while they were still on sale for 99 cents a container and I happened upon the just in Limited Edition Michael Jordan Gatorade bottles. I thought for sure I would never see these even though I had already heard about them because my store just is not that good at getting most limited edition items. Not only did I easily find all 6 of the label designs, but they were all on sale for only 75 cents a bottle, which is the cheapest I have ever seen Gatorade at my Safeway store. Of course, I just had to get the whole set. I ended up getting one of each design for my bottle collection and one of each color to actually try for “review” purposes (i.e. because I just like trying limited edition things and saying it is for the blog makes the spending of the money seem more justified). Anyways this post is about the first two bottles in the set and I will get to the other 4 in two more posts to come over the next few days.

The first two bottles in the Michael Jordan set of Gatorade bottles are the Championship Blue flavor. The flavor is a berry cherry blend. It is a decent Gatorade flavor, but like pretty much all Gatorade it is too sweet for me to drink more than a few sips unless I majorly water it down. I feel like the flavor is all berry and little cherry, as it tastes a lot like the berry pomegranate flavor, which I guess means that one is basically berry and not much pomegranate.

The label of the bottle that is 1 of 6 in the series has an image of Jordan playing for his high school team. It talks about Jordan being cut from his high school team as a sophomore and then working his way back to the team the next year and performing good enough to land a scholarship to University of North Carolina.

The label of the 2 of 6 bottle has an image of playing in college. The bottle talks about Jordan getting a jumper to win the NCAA championship for the University of North Carolina in 1982.

In honor Michael Jordan being inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame Gatorade is releasing six limited edition Gatorade Bottles. Gatorade has been one of the brands Michael Jordan has been partners with for a while. The limited edition bottles are the 32 ounce size ones like the Limited Edition Super Bowl XLIII ones. The bottles will not only include special labels, but also special flavors.

The limited edition Michael Jordan Gatorade bottles are to be in three special flavors. The three flavors are called Championship Blue, Championship Gold, and Championship Red. The blue flavor is berry cherry, the gold flavor is citrus orange, and the red flavor is berry blend. I am not sure if these are exactly unique flavors, as I do not know all the flavors Gatorade has these days, or they are just renamed flavors.

The bottles labels commemorate moments from Jordan’s basketball career. The labels include images from moments in his career along with text about his career. The labels also feature the design of his signature next to the G logo part of the label. There are six different label designs. I am not sure if the designs are mixed in all the flavors that they are releasing for this limited edition or there are two per flavor for the three flavors they are releasing the labels on.

I am not much of a Gatorade drinker nor I am much into basketball, however I once did watch basketball and that was when Jordan was on the Bulls. I think I will try to track down all these Gatorade bottles, which are to be released in the millions at supermarkets, convenience stores, and Walmarts, to add them to my bottle collection in my kitchen.

Earlier this year Tango released Limited Edition Tango Thanks cans. Now they have come out with another limited edition can design as part of their new ad campaign. The new cans are bigger than the normal size, as they are 440ml compared to usual 330ml. These new cans say New Size on top. The can has a black background. In the middle of an orange picture it says Tango With Added Tango. The can lists a number to call for those having unusual side effects from drinking too much Tango. Those that call the helpline will be entered into a contest with prizes that include a PlayStation and a bicycle.

Last summer Coca Cola has the 2008 Beijing Olympics set of limited edition cans. Now for this summer they have a special five set just simply called Summer 2009. The can designs only come on original Coca Cola cans. They are in the 24 and 12 packs for sure. I also have noticed some 20 ounce bottles with the sunglasses design, which seems to still be the current design. The five designs are supposed to be released one at a time with a new one coming every few weeks. Almost everywhere (have been in over 7 states already this summer since I am on a road trip) I have seen just the sunglasses one, but we did find the flag design at one Safeway in California (I think Oakland area).

The five designs for the Summer 2009 set include a beach ball, sunglasses, surfboards, barbecue, and flag. The beach ball design has the Coca Cola logo in one of the red panels of the red and white logo. The sunglasses design has the Coca Cola logo silhouetted in the sunglasses with parts of the words disappearing over the edge of the sunglasses design. The surfboard design has the Coca Cola logo silhouetted in one of the surf boards. The barbecue design has three Coca Cole logos coming out of the barbecue as if they are smoke clouds. The flag design has the normal Coca Cola logo with white stars and stripes to the right to make it look a little like an American flag design. Overall a pretty cool set that I am going to try to get one of each for my Coke can and bottle collection.

For a limited time the Pepsi company has released Throwback versions of Pepsi and Mountain Dew. These Throwback versions of the soft drinks are like the sodas used to be made before they began using high fructose corn syrup as the sweetener in the 1980s. Thus the target for these are those that remember the sodas being made with real sugar. The packaging also emphasizes that they are made with natural sugar, so it is also marketed towards the trend of people wanting more natural products. Both Pepsi Throwback and Mountain Dew Throwback are sweetened with a blend of cane and beet sugar.

Personally I am not a fan of Pepsi and especially dislike Mountain Dew, so this limited time thing does not matter to me, however I have been reading a lot of people saying they love the Throwback version and are planning on stocking up before these are expected to be off the shelves around June 13, 2009. I find non-diet sodas usually taste too sweet and I kind of doubt having natural sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup makes it better, but I guess it probably does taste less sweet just like diet sodas do not taste as sweet as regular soda. Still I find Pepsi gets flat too fast and tastes bad if it gets even a little warm, so never worth having around here, especially with it being in the upper 90s and 100s lately. As for Mountain Dew, I just have never liked the taste of it.

A special limited edition can of Tango fizzy drink is being released in their orange flavor. The limited edition can has the word Thanks! in place of the normal Tango brand name logo. The Thanks is related to thanking the public for saving the Tango brand. The brand is operated by Britvic Soft Drinks in the UK. In recent years the brand has had a sales slump and the company recently ran a “Save Tango” marketing campaign that blamed the decline on the British busybodies and an overobession with health. The campaign helped to sort of save the brand, although it seems unclear whether they ever expected to actually drop the Tango beverages in the near future or not. Anyways they have reported a 8% increase in sales of the 330ml cans in impulse outlets.

Back in 2007 Mountain Dew made limited edition Game Fuel to honor the release of Halo 3. The limited edition soda is returning this summer 2009. This time it will be promoting the World of Warcraft game. This World of Warcraft Mountain Dew (Mtn Dew on the bottle designs) limited edition promotion will include the Game Fuel reddish orange flavor that they had for the Halo 3 promotion, as well as a blue colored flavor. The red flavor for the World of Warcraft Game Fuel is called Horde Red and is a citrus cherry flavor. The blue flavor is called Alliance Blue is a wild berry type flavor. I believe the Horde Red flavor packaging has an Orc and the Alliance Blue limited edition packaging has a Night Elf.

NOS Energy drink has released a special limited edition 16 ounce can called the “Rowdy” can. It is a Kyle Busch commemorative NOS Energy Drink. I assume it is just the packaging that is special and the stuff inside is the regular NOS Energy Drink, but I am not positive, as I could not even find a picture of the product. Not to mention even the energy drink’s own website is not really loading for me past the home page, so I gave up trying to find a press release about it on their own website. NOS Energy Drink will be donating $25,000 to the Kyle Busch Foundation related to this limited edition can release. The can release is also part of their ongoing support of the No. 18 NASCAR car driven by Kyle Busch.