For generations of kids, summer tasted like a pitcher of Kool-Aid. Tear open a packet, stir in sugar and water, and suddenly there was enough bright red or purple drink for the whole neighborhood. But that little packet has a surprisingly humble origin in a small Nebraska town.
Kool-Aid was invented by Edwin Perkins in Hastings, Nebraska, in 1927. He was already selling a liquid fruit drink concentrate called Fruit Smack. To cut shipping costs, he found a way to remove the liquid and leave only a powder. That powder became Kool-Aid, and he did all his experimenting in his mother's kitchen.
A Young Man and a General Store
Perkins was born in Lewis, Iowa, in 1889. When he was a small child, his family moved to Hendley, Nebraska, where his father ran a general store. As a young man, Perkins worked with products like Jell-O, which the store sold.
He moved to Hastings in 1920, at age 31, interested in patent medicines and household products. He built a line of more than 125 items under the name Onor-Maid, sold door to door and by mail. One of the most popular was Fruit Smack.
From Liquid to Powder
Shipping a liquid concentrate was expensive. By turning Fruit Smack into a dry powder, Perkins could pack it into small envelopes that were light and cheap to mail and stock. He first called it Kool-Ade and promised shoppers 10 glasses of drink for 10 cents.
Demand was so strong that the product soon sold internationally, and his company focused entirely on it. Perkins moved production to Chicago in 1931. By 1934 the spelling had changed to Kool-Aid. In 1953, he sold the company to General Foods.
Oh, Yeah!
Soon after General Foods bought the brand, the Kool-Aid Man was born. He's a smiling pitcher full of the drink, famous in ads for bursting through the walls of children's homes and shouting his catchphrase, "Oh, yeah!" In 2013, he was redesigned as a computer-animated character.
Kool-Aid has had other uses too. Its colors stain so well that people have used it to dye hair and wool. And old Kool-Aid packages have become collectibles, with rare ones selling for up to several hundred dollars online.
The brand even slipped into everyday speech. To say someone has been "drinking the Kool-Aid" means they've bought into a group's ideas without questioning them. The phrase traces back to the 1978 tragedy at Jonestown in Guyana. Some accounts say the drink used there was mostly a cheaper rival, Flavor Aid, though both brands were among the commune's supplies.
Nebraska Still Celebrates
Hastings hasn't forgotten its famous invention. Every year on the second weekend in August, the city holds a summer festival called Kool-Aid Days. Kool-Aid is even Nebraska's official soft drink.
Perkins became a wealthy man, and his family gave generously back to Nebraska, including a recital hall and library at Hastings College. The Hastings Museum houses a recreation of his father's general store along with Kool-Aid memorabilia.
Today Kool-Aid is owned by Kraft Heinz, and it's still sold by the packet and the tub, along with sugar-free versions and single-serving packets made for bottled water. Not bad at all for a simple idea that started with one small-town inventor trying to save a few cents on shipping.
