Unless you’re 14 years old, there’s no reason to ever bring this within 20 feet of your mouth–even for the sake of reporting on caffeinated tea-flavored malt beverages. It is not that this stuff is bad – it is like drinking Zima or a Shandy ( a popular drink in the UK mixing pilsner and 7-up) – a completely worthless buzz with an equally worthless drunk. This is barely good, but extra sweet and extra gooey – tasting both weak and artificial. Of all the drinks to consume in an evening, you would be so much better off drinking fruit punch or just a diet anything with a shot in it. Even at Tea Partays, there is no better way to be a HUGE dork than to whip one of these out at a gathering. I guarantee you will be bringing the full 6 pack home with you after the party untouched. Please – let this oddity from smirnoff die.
DiaGeo has been selling this drink since 2006, but with very little marketing minus a cheesy viral video that might have been funny when white guys rapping was comedy back in 1985.
Their slogan is “Smirnoff takes natural raw tea brewed in a premium malt beverage that is then ice-filtered five times to create a powerfully smooth, infinitely refreshing taste that is naturally loaded with flavor!” I think the ice filtering took out the flavor, caffeine and alcohol with it.
Buzz/Nutrition:2
230 calories per 12oz bottle? And what do you get for your 230 calories… You get an oversweet not very alcoholic (5%) tea – something that will provide none of the buzz or good effects of the energy drink ingredients they are supposed to have added. I called the main manufacturer ofr the drinks here in the US, and no one ther could tell me how much caffeine, ginseng or any other ingredient was in this – the only thing they could tell me is to check on their website for nutritional information. In other words, no one there knows how much caffeine or nutrients is in here – but I promise you it cant be very much.
Taste:2
It comes in three very non-exciting or original flavors, all of them tasting very artificial and overly sweet. Raspberry, Lemon, and Peach. If you must have one ( I.E. you are at an underage drinking party and no one there knows how to buy a decent selection of drinks) I would grab the lemon – it is the least bad of the three I tried.
Packaging:4
no information, no website, just a simple bottle with a neat and clean logo. If only they felt the desire to even Point to the place to go for more info – but there was none to be found. I have seen worse, but this is certainly not very good.
Website:teapartay.com:3
Do you remember when people used to make fun of urkel? Or screech? White guys pretending to rap is as old as Wierd al making fun of the Fat Boys. The fact that they tried so hard to make this cool is inadvertantly funny. At what point did they think this was a good idea enough to make 2 of these videos, and wrap their whole marketing scheme around them? Th website is their 2 videos, a little tiny bit of info about the drink, and a bunch of unfinished links. For a drink launched in 2006 that is just plain unexcusable. Sorry Smirnoff – but you are beyond yesterday’s news – and make beer