Shortly after the 1969 Orange Bowl, Robert Cade entered into an agreement providing Stokely - Van Camp, Inc. (S - VC), a canned - food packaging company, with the U.S. rights to production and sale of Gatorade as a commercial product. In the same year, a licensing arrangement made Gatorade the official sports drink of the National Football League (NFL), representing the first in a history of professional sports sponsorship for the Gatorade brand. A year after its commercial introduction, S - VC tested multiple variations of the original Gatorade recipe, finally settling on more palatable variants in lemon - lime and orange flavors. This reformulation also removed the sweetener cyclamate -- which was banned by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1969 - replacing it with additional fructose. In the early 1970s, legal questions arose regarding whether or not the researchers who invented Gatorade were entitled to ownership of its royalties, since they had been working under a research grant from the federal government which provided financial stipends. The University of Florida also claimed partial rights of ownership, which was brought to resolution in 1973 in the form of a settlement awarding the university with a 20 - percent share of Gatorade royalties. As of 2009, the university had received more than $150 million from its share, and was receiving approximately $12 million per year.
when was gatorade first sold to the public
1969 1969