William Wrigley Jr. came to Chicago in the spring of 1891. He was 29 years old, had $32 in his pocket, and possessed unlimited energy and great talent as a salesman. He started out selling soap. As an extra incentive to merchants to carry Wrigley’s soap, he offered them free baking powder. When baking powder proved to be more popular than soap, he switched to the baking powder business. One day, Mr. Wrigley got the idea to offer merchants free chewing gum with each can of baking powder. The rest is history. Wrigley then went on to make Lotta and Vassar gums in 1892 and Juicy Fruit and Spearmint introduced in 1893. The success was not huge at first, but the company persevered and is now one of the largest chewing gum manufacturers in the U.S.

I am an avid gum chewer, but I usually stick to mint flavored gums. This is my first experience with a coffee flavored gum, so forgive me if I seem apprehensive. The gum smells great, though. It smells just like a sweet cup of coffee – minus the steam, of course. The gum itself is the usual, flat stick that we have come to recognize as the signature Wrigley’s gum, only this gum is a light brown color with a white, powdery substance on the outside. Ok, candy kids, enough looking at it; let’s give this new gum a shot! Well what do you know? It tastes great! It tastes like a sweet, creamy cup of coffee. Not too strong and not too sweet. And the flavor just keeps on going. That’s what I’ve always loved about Wrigley’s gum – the long lasting flavor. And this keeps going and going. I think the only downside to this gum is that it leaves you with coffee breath, which is what I try to avoid and mask with minty gum. I think that this is a great new product, but I’d keep some mint gum handy if you plan on chewing this while you’re out and about.