Mission Orange (or “Mission of California”) is what some might call a “Zombie Brand”. This is a term used when a brand is resurrected after a period of decline or inactivity. I’m not convinced that that’s applicable here, and I believe that Mission is actually a living fossil of the United States’ beverage history.

For me, the story begins while walking through my local H Mart in Lynnwood, Washington. They have a varied and unpredictable beverage section, so I try to keep an eye out for interesting items. I noticed a few glass bottle sodas with Arabic writing that I’d never seen before and decided to bring them home for additional research. I reviewed the sodas in this blog post, and learned that they were all bottled in Baghdad. The bottle that was fully branded in Arabic was “Mishn”, and their story was fascinating.

The name is of the soda is actually a transliteration of the English word “Mission” into Arabic letters that sound the same (“mishn”). Mishn isn’t exactly native to the Middle East, it was introduced to the region back in the 1950’s when the US brand, Mission of California started doing international licensing.

Old Mission Orange

I’m pretty familiar with soda history, but I had never heard of this brand before. The internet is light on details, but what I pieced together is that the company started back in the 1920’s as the California Crushed Fruit Corporation. I’ve seen evidence that they sold both sparkling and non-sparkling varieties of fruit beverages. The prohibition movement probably helped grow their popularity, and they changed the name and branding a couple times over the next 30 years. There are bottles from this period labeled “Mission”, and “Mission Dry”, and even a black/dark glass packaging that looked a lot more like a premium beer than a soft drink.

  • Old stock certificate
  • Glass bottle evolution
  • Mission of California bottle

By the 1950’s the brand had settled on “Mission of California” as the name, and they used bright blue labels with white lettering in a sort of curvy bow tie design over a clear glass bottle with a slightly twisted neck. Mission of California moved their headquarters at some point to the New England area, and I read stories of people’s grandparents with Mission of California delivery routes. People would visit gas stations or small stores and grab a cold bottle out of the ice chest out front. It sounds very Normal Rockwell Americana, but it wouldn’t last. Likely due to competition from our modern day soda giants, Mission of California slowly faded away and eventually disappeared completely from the US market by the 1970’s.

Iraq – Mishn Orange

That’s why seeing a bottle of Mission of California in an H Mart is so jarring. The soda has been absent in the United States for over 50 years, but at least one bottler in the Middle East is still going strong. Crystal Baghdad is the current bottler, and they have a few other flavors as well. I haven’t been able to confirm how they acquired the rights to produce and sell the soda, but social media sources have told me that production has been disrupted throughout the years during political instability.

I wouldn’t count on “Mishn” being available consistently in your neighborhood grocery store, but if you find this “Zombie” soda, you should give it a try. It’s a more natural orange flavor than most of what we sell in the United States, it has a lot of carbonation, and a smooth texture from the cane sugar sweetener. There’s also a message on the label that translates to “Refresh your heart”. That’s cute.

products from Crystal Baghdad (www.crystal-baghdad.com)

Have you ever tried Mission of California’s Orange soda? What about “Mishn”? I’d love to hear from you. If you find it, you’re drinking a bit of history with every bottle.

Thank you to the Recipe Reminiscing blog for posting about the topic back in 2016. It gave me a few breadcrumbs to follow.