Steffy: Dublin to celebrate despite Dr Pepper snub

The window of Dublin's iconic bottling plant sports a new logo, but the plant still uses the same 1920s-era equipment that made it famous. The window of Dublin's iconic bottling plant sports a new logo, but the plant still uses the same 1920s-era equipment that made it famous. Photo: Courtesy Photo Photo: Courtesy Photo Image 1 of / 9 Caption Close Steffy: Dublin to celebrate despite Dr Pepper snub 1 / 9 Back to Gallery

This Saturday, if you drive northwest from Waco on Texas 6, you'll pass through Dublin.

The town's name won't change, as it has one day each year for decades, to "Dr Pepper, Texas," and no one will be crowned Miss Pretty Peggy Pepper.

Those long-standing traditions died with the settlement of a lawsuit in January that also threatened to kill the iconic soft drink bottling plant on Patrick Street, the town's main drag. The plant, though, has reinvented itself with a new line of beverages it hopes to begin selling in Houston soon.

The plant's annual birthday celebration will continue - some 2,000 people are expected to attend, slightly fewer than last year - but without mention of the soft drink with which it has been most closely associated during its 121 years.

"We're still having the party," said Jeff Kloster, vice president of what's now called Dublin Bottling Works. "It's going to have the same feel, and it's going to celebrate the history of that plant."

Kloster's tone is upbeat, even though his company faces its greatest challenge in more than a century. The plant soldiers on, despite being stripped of its rights to make the cult-classic beverage "Dublin Dr Pepper" with vintage bottling equipment and cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup.

But this year's festival will be different, like a family reunion after a divorce.

"You won't see the Dr Pepper signs up on the city limits of Dublin this year," Kloster said flatly.

Was that just a hint of bitterness in his voice? Who could blame him if it was?

Two weeks after last year's festival, Kloster was walking the floor of the plant, founded in 1891, that his family has run for three generations when a reporter called asking about the lawsuit. It was the first he'd heard of it.

Dr Pepper Snapple Group, the multibillion-dollar Plano-based corporation that owns the formula for Dr Pepper, sued the Dublin plant, claiming it was infringing on corporate trademarks by putting the "Dublin" name on Dr Pepper bottles and selling soft drinks outside its prescribed territory.

'Corporate jealousy'

For decades, Dr Pepper corporate celebrated the unique Dublin brand, but in recent years, it came to see the Dublin operation as a threat. In the response to the lawsuit, Kloster accused the big company of "corporate jealousy."

Any potential threat that Dublin Dr Pepper posed to the Plano company or its other bottlers paled compared with the marketing benefits it generated. Dublin Dr Pepper was soft drink chic, a Texas treasure amid a sea of unremarkable sugar water.

But that no longer seemed to matter.

In January, after months of costly legal battling, Kloster settled the case, agreed to stop making Dr Pepper and removed all mentions of the drink from the factory.

Triple XXX Root Beer

He refuses, though, to let Dr Pepper's corporate bullying get him down. The plant continues to make Triple XXX Root Beer, and it's rolling out six new drinks, including Vanilla Cream Soda, Cherry Limeade and Vintage Cola. They're all made with cane sugar in the same classic way the Dublin plant has always operated, and each is emblazoned with the Dublin name.

"Since we own them, we don't have any licensing issue," Kloster said. "We're going to sell them everywhere."

While Kloster declined to discuss the private company's finances or how much it's spent on the new sodas, it clearly faces an uphill battle without the affiliation of a national brand and the distribution capabilities to blanket the market.

Two factors in success

Soft drink success comes down to two things: brand recognition and shelf space, said Tom Pirko, managing director of the consulting firm Bevmark.

While the Dublin drinks may struggle to gain market prominence, they should benefit from an awareness of the Dublin name and a strong dose of retro chic.

"There is a part of the soft drink business that is nostalgia-based," Pirko said. "People like to reach back to something familiar."

And that may be enough to generate a following.

"There's a sense of staying power," he said. "The fact that they've been around a long time could help them. I really think they have a shot."

This weekend, then, isn't about beauty contests or name changes. It's truly a birthday, or perhaps, a re-birthday.

Loren Steffy, loren.steffy@chron.com, is the Chronicle's business columnist. His commentary appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Follow him online at blog.chron.com/lorensteffy, www.facebook.com/LorenSteffypage and twitter.com/lsteffy.