We Tried a New Blood Orange Sunkist

We’re barely a month into 2025, and it seems like everybody and their mother is bragging about a new exclusive drink. From Target locking down a caffeinated hydration line from a celebrity podcaster to Walmart snagging their own Sprite variant coming in March, everyone’s trying to get a piece of that exclusivity pie. Case in point, Casey’s General Store (aka “the gas station that does pizza”) has their very own exclusive Sunkist flavor. You know, Sunkist? Keurig Dr Pepper’s answer to Fanta and Crush? Well, they’ve got a new Sunkist flavor you can’t get anywhere else: Sunkist Raspberry Blood Orange.

Sound familiar? Maybe because Casey’s used to be the exclusive home of Sunkist Strawberry Orange! But since early summer 2024, Sunkist Strawberry Orange has been exclusively available at (of course) Walmart in the 12oz can format. Before Walmart put a ring on it, the flavor was only available in 20oz bottles at Casey’s General Store locations. This wouldn’t be the first time a gas station exclusive soda went on to be sold at a much larger nationwide chain; real soda-heads will recall Mountain Dew Purple Thunder’s journey from “Circle K exclusive” to “Kroger family of stores exclusive.”

Anyway, we’re talking about Sunkist Raspberry Blood Orange here. Let’s talk about what it tastes like.

New Sunkist Flavor!

Sunkist Raspberry Blood Orange

Casey’s

Pros: This new Sunkist flavor is definitely a sweet raspberry-and-something soda. I can’t claim to discern blood orange in the flavors I get out of this drink, but considering how tart blood orange can be, that might be for the best. I wasn’t able to track down a Sunkist Strawberry Orange to compare this to, but I bet the flavors are very similar. It feels like a suitable substitute for the folks who were sad to see Strawberry Orange leave their precious pizza place gas station drink cooler.

Cons: There’s no reason this couldn’t just have been Raspberry Orange. Sunkist doesn’t sell a Raspberry Orange soda at this time, and I doubt there are enough blood orange fanatics out there to make up for everyone who might be turned off by the comparatively-exotic fruit used here. And call me crazy, but maybe we leave the word “blood” out of non-Halloween soda names, just to be safe.

Credit: Liv Averett / Sunkist

Rating:

7/10

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