Coca-Cola Company (KO) plans to discontinue sales of all Minute Maid frozen juice concentrates in the U.S. and Canada. The decision means an end to an 80-year run for the frozen OJ cans as the company pivots toward ready-to-drink and refrigerated juices that are seen as a better match for modern consumer preferences. The beverage giant plans for the phase-out to begin this year, with varieties like frozen orange juice, lemonade, pink lemonade, raspberry lemonade, and limeade sold only until existing inventories are depleted.
Consumer demand in the juice category has increasingly migrated from frozen concentrate to chilled and shelf-stable juice options, while the broader frozen beverage category has been declining. In addition, changing attitudes toward sugar and rising input costs for orange juice are factors in the decision by the Atlanta-based company.
Minute Maid’s frozen concentrate is historically significant because it helped make orange juice a year-round breakfast staple when it launched nationally in 1946, allowing consumers to reconstitute orange juice from frozen cans regardless of seasonality or fresh fruit access. Notably, through the 1950s and 1960s, those frozen concentrates were often the primary way Americans consumed orange juice at home.
Coca-Cola (KO) acquired the fast-growing Minute Maid brand in 1960 and used it as the foundation of what became its Coca-Cola Foods (later juice) division. Under Coca-Cola’s ownership, Minute Maid expanded beyond frozen concentrate into shelf-stable juices, Hi-C fruit drinks, and eventually refrigerated not-from-concentrate offerings starting in the 1970s.