By Dan Morrell

Sugary drinks are a real problem, but alternatives are hard to make.

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All those anti-soda PSAs and softdrink bans have given an opening to smaller, specialty sodas such as Jones's and Boylan's, but most of those are still made with sweetened syrups. Bill Creelman aimed higher: soda that lives up to the FDA's strict labeling requirements for "fresh," without superheated concentrates or syrups. His Spindrift Soda is just fresh-squeezed fruit juice, cane sugar, and carbonated water. It sells for $2.50 per 12-ounce bottle, the tally of costs incurred because America's soda-production system isn't set up to be juice-friendy.

Step 1Find the freshness It took nearly a year for Creelman to figure out how to flavor the soda--mostly hunting down places whose nectar qualifies as FDA-certified fresh. "There are plenty of people who make fresh-squeezed juice on a small scale," says Creelman. "But it was next to impossible to find anyone who sold it on a commercial scale." He stitched together four suppliers, including one that ships weekly from India.

Step 2Look for cold storage Many facilities can brew a new soda, but few have the on-site refrigeration that Creelman's fresh juice needed. (And why would they? Concentrates in most sodas can stay at room temperature for months.) It took him weeks to find a facility with a big fridge--and then he lost the contract after the first batch, when gobs of pulpy fruit stalled production lines.

Step 3Recruit mixing manpower At a new facility in central Massachusetts, Creelman honed production. Then he discovered another problem: Temperature-sensitive juices can't sit out in vats the way syrups can. They have to be delivered in one-gallon plastic jugs, stored properly, and then opened at the last minute to be added and mixed by hand. That means a lot of costly manpower goes into every batch.

Step 4Send with the fish Bottles were tough to send to stores because most soda distributors don't ship cold. (Again, why would they? Normal soda easily ships warm, and big juice companies have their own trucks.) So Creelman found distributors of fish, produce, and cheese willing to take his bottles to more than 200 retailers. "Without exception, our distributors have no prior experience with beverages," says Creelman.

Step 5Follow the trail Some shops aren't used to ordering soda through a fish distributor, so Creelman has to travel and explain the process in person. This was initially a hassle, but Creelman now feels fortunate: Unlike typical biweekly beverage distribution, fresh distributors deliver daily, allowing them to quickly spot and respond to problems. "The fresh distributors are the key to our success," says Creelman.

Gallons of soda the average American drinks every year: 50

Max amount of fructose (of which high consumption is linked to health troubles) in soda's high-fructose corn syrup, according to the Corn Refiners Association: 55%

Amount of fructose actually in some sodas, including Coke and Pepsi, per a 2010 study in the journal Obesity: 65%

[Illustration by McKibillo]

Related: Breathable Buzz

A version of this article appears in the February 2012 issue of Fast Company.

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