What if you could turn sparkling water into Coke? That鈥檚 the idea behind a new product that鈥檚 racked up $225,935 on Indiegogo鈥攎ore than 4.5 times its original goal.
is advertised as a plastic, BPA-free vessel infused with aromatic flavors that you can both smell and taste when you drink water听from it. It鈥檚 been written up everywhere from People听to Mashable to Entrepreneur as the miracle alternative听to plain water, though experts aren鈥檛 certain it鈥檒l work as well as advertised.
鈥淲hen your nose is over the cup it picks up the aroma, and the tongue flirts with the sweet taste coming out of the rim,鈥 says the cup鈥檚 inventor, an Israeli entrepreneur named Isaac Lavi, 47, who goes by Dr. Scent on Facebook. Because as much as 90 percent of flavor comes from our sense of smell, while the rest comes from taste, texture, and temperature, the cup, Lavi says, tricks the brain into thinking plain water drunk from it has the cup鈥檚 flavor.
That idea is sound, says Dr. Gary Reineccius, who teaches courses on food flavoring at the University of Minnesota鈥檚 Department of Food Science. Though he鈥檚 skeptical about the execution.
Currently, six cup flavors are scheduled to hit the market in April 2016: mixed berry, orange, apple, lemon lime, peach. Cola, meant for use with sparkling water, was added to the lineup when the Right Cup met its $200,000听fundraising stretch goal in December.
鈥淚f you just poured up a cup and drank it, that would be fine, probably,鈥 Gary Reineccius says. But if you let it sit, with water touching the rim, 鈥渋t would be sickeningly sweet and overly flavored.鈥
The flavors used in the cups are FDA-approved chemicals, Lavi says, the same as you鈥檇 find in any artificially flavored drink. But those chemicals are suspended between the molecules of the Right Cup鈥檚 polymers and their leech rate, or how much of those chemicals make it into the water, Lavi says, is 鈥渧irtually zero.鈥
That, says Reineccius, is unlikely. 鈥淪weetness you don鈥檛 smell, and that鈥檚 required to support a flavor, just like tartness,鈥 which is needed to achieve many fruit flavors, he says. 鈥淏ut flavors like sweetness and tartness, they don鈥檛 come out into the air, they come out into water.鈥
Which means the rim of the cup must release flavor compounds into the water. That鈥檚 not a bad thing. Artificial flavors aren鈥檛 necessarily any worse for you than natural flavors. But, Reiniccius says, that mode of delivery could make it difficult to achieve the right flavor balance; you鈥檇 have to use the cup under strict, ideal conditions every time to get the right taste.
鈥淚f you just poured up a cup and drank it, that would be fine, probably,鈥 he says. But if you let it sit, with water touching the rim, 鈥渋t would be sickeningly sweet and overly flavored.鈥 And to achieve cola and many fruit flavors, he points out, the rim would need tartness, or acidity. Balancing the release of those compounds with the sweetness and the cup鈥檚 aroma would be tough. 鈥淚t鈥檒l be interesting to see where it goes,鈥 he says.
Some of the cups鈥 flavor does, Lavi says, escape into the air over time, giving the cups a life span of six-to-eight听months. Sensitive smellers who take care of their cups鈥攈and wash, no microwaving, store upside down听鈥渢o encapsulate the smell,鈥 Lavi says鈥攃an expect the trickery to last more than two years, though Reiniccius suspects it won鈥檛 last that long.
Still, the $20ish per cup price tag may be low enough to entice chemical-averse health nuts bored of water. (That鈥檚 the cost equivalent of about 60 glasses of Crystal Light.) The Indiegogo campaign continues through mid-January, with the first batch of Right Cups shipping in April 2016.