Fanta is the Coca-Cola soft drink that originated in Germany during World War II.
Coca-Cola Deutschland developed Fanta in 1940 after wartime trade restrictions and blockades made it difficult to import the ingredients needed for Coca-Cola syrup. Max Keith, who led the German Coca-Cola operation, oversaw the creation of a drink made from ingredients available locally, including whey and apple pomace.
The wartime beverage was not the same as today’s familiar orange Fanta. Production of the original German formula ended in 1949, while the modern orange version was developed in Naples, Italy, in 1955. Coca-Cola later expanded the brand internationally.
A common mix-up is assuming Fanta began as an orange soda. Orange flavor became central only with the postwar Italian formulation; the original drink was a wartime Coca-Cola substitute with a very different recipe. The name came from “Fantasie,” the German word for imagination.