Tab Hunter

 I used to do a bit about a girl at a party freaking out because she was sure that she had been given a regular Coke instead of a Tab. I preface this by saying I "used to" because there just aren't that many people left in the world who know what Tab is. I do. I grew up with Tab. I was only a year old when the first bright pink cans of that diet cola came rolling off the line. 

Yes, Tab came in bottles as well, but that's not how it will be remembered. It was that daring packaging veer away from the parent company Coca Cola red that made it distinct. The can that screamed "sugar free! sugar free!" before you ever got to the name of the soda. This was a game changer. A huge deal because a can of Tab would only set you back one calorie. That's right. Just one. You would expend more energy yanking the tab off of your Tab than you would gain by drinking it. Or something like that. It was the beginning of what we now know as diet soda. Like many Coke products, there were plenty of permutations for the original formula: fruit flavors, ginger ale, root beer, and the inevitable caffeine free version. All of which were based on the idea that you could still have your pop and drink it too if you were trying to lose weight. Which a lot of people wanted to do in the mid to late sixties. And seventies.. And into the eighties. 

Except that there was that rat problem. Not that rats were involved in the actual making of the beverage, but the fact that they got bladder cancer after drinking Tab gave the pink can a tarnished image. It was saccharine that ruined those rats' lives. And it was feared that it would ruin the bladders and lives of humans too, so rather than banning it, the FDA insisted that Coke put a label on every can, bottle and two liter jug: "Use of this product may be hazardous to your health. This product contains saccharin which has been determined to cause cancer in laboratory animals." And this was on top of the can being pink. 

As it turned out, the saccharin that was in Tab didn't ruin the bladders of humans, but this didn't necessarily save it from the recycling bin of history. In 1982, Coke began brewing Diet Coke, presumably to compete with themselves. And that faint heartbeat heard in Tabland began to diminish still further. It was one more slot on the fountain an any fast food joint, or button on any Coke machine that didn't need to be there if the world wanted Diet Coke. Instead of Tab? In a pink can? 

Please.

Well, nearly sixty years later, the final nail in Tab's coffin is being hammered into the coffin of Coca Cola's first diet drink. The soft drink Godzilla is killing of its "zombie brands," including Odwalla juice, which will make my wife tear up. And Tab. Which will make anorexic boys and girls around the world panic. Or maybe it would have a few decades ago. Now that Coke has its own brand water, there's no reason not to streamline things as much as possible. To be clear, Tab had a pretty good run. Sixty years is about fifty-nine years and six months longer than New Coke lasted. 

A toast to Tab, artificially flavored brown water never had it so good.