Enter Flavorman

When Marty Snyder, Business Director for Flavorman, returned home from BevNET LIVE earlier this month, he did so with a fresh sense of purpose and list of to-do’s. One of the first things he did was invite BevNET to visit Flavorman at its Louisville, KY headquarters. We love to see beverage creation at work, so we gladly accepted their invite.

Founded by David Dafoe over 19 years ago, Flavorman is still known to many as Pro-Liquitech. The company officially changed its name to Flavorman in 2010. Known by the slogan “The Beverage Architects,” Flavorman takes beverage ideas and molds them into finished products. The halls of their headquarters are lined with photos and cans and bottles of quite a few of those ideas. It was a misty-eyed trip for BevNET to see so many dear beverages, some long since departed.

BevNET toured the entire facility including their beverage lab, a materials storage room, a mixing facility, and a room for shelf-life testing. While we toured the lab, the head flavorist was mixing samples of prototype beverages that featured colors not traditionally associated with their respective flavor, like a purple strawberry. Flavorman intends to serve these color-confused beverages to kids at a local fair this summer as a game to see how well the kids use their sense of taste to override the ever-powerful flavor/color associations. For the record, BevNET went 4 for 6 on identifying the flavors, with a couple narrow misses. Tart watermelon tastes a heck of a lot like green apple.