When you think of Fanta soda, what comes to mind? Guessing it's a candy-colored swirl of ladies dancing on the beach and imploring, Coca-Cola's beloved line of fruit-flavored sodas has a decidedly Latin spin to its marketing, so it's easy to assume the drink was invented in South America. However, Fanta is a soda born deep inside Nazi Germany at the height of World War II — the result of a concerted effort by Coke's German division to keep the lights on during wartime by any production methods necessary. Coca-Cola's extensive family of sodas, waters, teas and more can be found in over 200 countries today.
The company continues to innovate with exciting new flavors like and limited offerings like . But back in the 1930s, Coke was just beginning to expand its footprint internationally, and hadn't strayed from its core beverage. Despite the double whammy of the Great Depression and global war impacting other markets, the Coke business in Nazi Germany thrived — that is, until various trade embargoes following America's entrance into WWII made importing its proprietary syrup flavor impossible.
Undaunted, Coke's then-head of German operations instructed his team to invent a new soda using their existing resources. The result was Fanta. Fanta was invented out of Nazi food scraps In 1906, Coca-Cola opened bottling facilities in its first three non-US markets, Cuba, Panama, and Canada.
European facilities followed in France in 1919, with Germany's first Coca-Cola bottling plant op.