For a number of years now I have found it difficult to find soda water in our local supermarkets.

Coming from the Second Republic, when we were used to shortages of flavourings, bottles, bottle lids, labels,  I could not understand why we were seeing shortages today; gone were the days of foreign exchange shortages and since this was soda water there are no flavourings involved in its manufacture. All that is needed is Carbon Dioxide. How difficult can that be?

A year or two ago, in desperation because soda water is the only carbonated drink that we use, I contacted the manufacturers inNdola. We were able to arrange to pay for and collect from their depot inLusaka. This worked well although because their depot is on theMumbwa Road, we found it much easier to buy 20 cases at time so that we did not have to traverse town and the traffic too often.

But still the problem existed – most often when we called to arrange a collection, they had none in stock and could not tell us when they would have stock. Clearly there was a distribution problem.

Then I came across Soda King soda water in Spar, and managed to track them down inLusaka.

I say track them down because it was not easy – there was no telephone number on the label and the number in the telephone directory went elsewhere.  But Soda King do have a web page and I managed to get a telephone number from there.

What a pleasure.  One phone call and within a couple of hours, twenty cases were delivered to my office.  The second order went just as well; again it was delivered to me promptly.

Soda King is a franchise with the principals inSouth Africaand they produce a variety of drinks – the usual mixers – Tonic, Ginger Ale, Lemonade and Dry Lemon. Their range of lightly carbonated drinks include Ginger beer, Red Grape,Orange, Strawberry, Sparking Lemon,  Sparkling Apple and Pineapple.  Bottled water and sparkling water, plain or flavoured is also available.

As I sit here in a sweltering November where the rain seems to be nowhere in sight, the bottles with their brightly coloured ingredients, have me licking my lips in anticipation. I shall certainly be looking out for and buying a selection of their flavoured drinks next time I am shopping.

For trade enquiries, contact Bessie on 0978 519-175