Sunkist Growers

In the late 1880s, California citrus growers began organizing themselves into cooperatives, with the goal of increasing profits by pooling their risk and increasing their collective bargaining power with jobbers and packers. The economic depression that began in 1893 worsened farmers' situations, and intensified their desire to self-organize to their own benefit.

In 1893, P.J. Dreher and his son, Edward L. Dreher, who became the "father of the California citrus industry" (1877–1964), along with several other prominent citrus farmers and land owners formed the Southern California Fruit Exchange in Claremont, a small college town 30 miles (48 km) east of Los Angeles. The exchange originally represented only orange growers; in 1896 lemon growers joined. Growers from Los Angeles County, Orange County, and Riverside County were among the original members and later expanded to growers and groves in San Bernardino and Ventura Counties. By 1905, the exchange represented 5,000 members, 45% of the California citrus industry, and renamed itself the California Fruit Growers Exchange (CFGE).

In 1909 the CFGE launched a successful marketing campaign promoting their brand of "Sunkist" oranges in the Midwest by competing with apples. Instructional circulars were sent to grocers describing how to display oranges in bulk, while large newspaper ads promoted the fruit to customers. Store displays compared prices for apples and oranges side-by-side which increased inventory turnover and cash flow for the grocer. At the same time, California State Senator Frank Flint in Washington D. C. delivered 30 boxes of "Sun-kist" oranges to congressmen and the Vice President, whose testimonials were used for promotion.

Between 1927 and 1939, the exchange sold more than 75% of all California citrus. In the 1947–48 season, the exchange had around 15,000 citrus growers. In 1952, it changed its name to Sunkist Growers, Inc.

As of 2007, Sunkist markets fresh oranges, lemons, limes, grapefruits, and tangerines to 12 states and three Canadian provinces, from 6,000 growers in California and Arizona. From 1971 to 2014, Sunkist was based in the Sherman Oaks district of Los Angeles; in September 2014, it relocated to the Valencia neighborhood of Santa Clarita. Through trademark agreements, Sunkist has licensed its trademark to other firms such as General Mills and Snapple, for marketing more than 600 mainly citrus-flavored products including soft drinks and juice drinks, vitamins, and jellies and candies in more than 50 countries. Sunkist also owns two citrus processing plants which manufacture juice, oils, pulp and peels. Sunkist's subsidiaries for marketing, international sales and fruit purchasing include SunMac Hawaii Ltd., Sunkist Global, LLC in California, Sunkist Pacific, Ltd., in Japan, Sunkist (Far East) Promotion Ltd., in Hong Kong, and Sunkist Real Estate Ltd., in California. Sales in 1991 totalled $956 million, with nearly half of revenues generated outside the United States.

In its early years, the primary problem facing the California citrus industry was an oversupply of fruit. By 1907, California was producing five times as many oranges as fifteen years earlier. As newly planted orange groves began to bear fruit, the market was flooded with unsalable oranges, and trees were cut down; this prompted a young marketing executive, Albert Lasker with the Lord & Thomas ad agency, who endeavored to avoid food waste, to pitch a sales plan. In 1907 the CFGE approved the first-ever large-scale advertising campaign aimed at marketing a perishable commodity. The March 1907 campaign, promoting oranges to Iowans as "healthy" and "summery", resulted in a 50% increase in orange sales in that state. It also launched the Sunkist brand: Lord & Thomas originally proposed using the adjective "sun-kissed" to describe the CFGE oranges; the word eventually used in the campaign was Sunkist, created by the agency as a mnemonic device which would be easier to defend if used as a trademark.

In an effort to distinguish Sunkist oranges from others, the CFGE wrapped its oranges in paper stamped with the Sunkist brand name. In 1909, after Sunkist learned that merchants were selling non-Sunkist oranges as Sunkist, it began to offer consumers a free Sunkist-branded spoon in exchange for mailing in twelve Sunkist wrappers. One million spoons were claimed in the first year of the promotion, further establishing the brand in consumers' minds and giving merchants a reason to want to display Sunkist oranges in their original wrappers. By 1910, because of the promotion, Sunkist had become the world's largest purchaser of cutlery.

The success of early campaigns prompted Sunkist to invest heavily in advertising, and in coming decades the brand was advertised in magazines and on radio, on billboards, streetcars and railroad cars, on the sides of speedboats, in school curricula and essay contests, and in pamphlets distributed in doctors' offices. Its messaging was aimed to reposition oranges in the minds of consumers. Rather than a luxury to be enjoyed only at Christmas, Sunkist wanted people to believe oranges were essential for good health and to eat one every day.

Sunkist also invested in marketing fresh-squeezed orange juice and lemonade as superior alternatives to "artificial" beverages such as Coca-Cola. By the mid-1930s, one Sunkist orange in five was being consumed in juice form, often at soda fountains, and Sunkist juice was the second-most-popular soda fountain drink, after Coca-Cola.