Image copyright www.cocacola.co.jp 
 
 Coca-Cola has launched its first alcoholic drink, a lemon flavoured alcopop, in Japan in a bid to tap new markets and consumers. 
 
 In a global first for the US drinks giant, three fizzy lemon drinks went on sale on Monday. 
 
 The product aims at a growing market of young drinkers - especially women. 
 
 Described by Coca-Cola as "unique" in the company's 125-year history, the three drinks range from 3% to 8% alcohol. 
 
 In keeping with the company's tradition, the recipe is closely guarded but the drinks are modelled on the country's popular Chu-Hi drinks, usually a mix of local spirit and a range of fruit flavours. 
 
 Image copyright AFP Image caption The drinks hit the shelves on Monday 
 
 Chu-Hi - an abbreviation for shochu highball - has been marketed as an alternative to beer, proving especially popular with female drinkers. 
 
 Local companies like Suntory, Asahi and Kirin currently dominate the sector for canned Chu-Hi drinks. 
 
 The most popular flavours are strong citrus ones such as grapefruit or lemon, the latter one being the taste Coca Cola now wants a share of. 
 
 Image copyright www.suntory.co.jp Image caption Chu-Hi drinks are often aimed at young women 
 
 Coca-Cola says there are no plans to bring the new drinks range to markets outside Japan. 
 
 Alcopop drinks boomed in Europe and the UK in the 1990s with the likes of Smirnoff Ice and Bacardi Breezer becoming hugely popular. 
 
 They were controversial, with concerns they encouraged young people to drink more alcohol because of soft drink-like taste. ||||| Coca-Cola will soon be giving Japanese consumers a new kind of buzz. 
 
 In a departure from its traditional soda business, Coke (KO) plans to launch an alcoholic drink in Japan this year. It's trying to get in on the growing market for "chu-hi" -- canned, flavored drinks typically made with sparkling water and shochu, a Japanese spirit distilled from grains. 
 
 The new drink is a "highly Japan-specific approach given the complexity and richness" of Coke's range of products in the country, Coke spokesperson Yohko Okabe told CNN on Wednesday. 
 
 The company declined to give further details on the plans, but in a recent blog post, the president of Coca-Cola Japan said the drink would be "unique" in Coke's history. 
 
 "We haven't experimented in the low alcohol category before," Jorge Garduño said in the post. 
 
 The storied soft drinks company is set to enter a crowded market. Big Japanese beverage makers like Kirin (KNBWY) and Suntory (STBFY) already produce popular "chu-hi" drinks. 
 
 Related: Coca-Cola's new CEO: 'We've got to experiment' 
 
 Brewing up an alcoholic beverage is just Coke's latest Japanese experiment. 
 
 The country is one of the company's most competitive and fast changing markets. It says it launches about 100 new products there every year. 
 
 Other big global brands have tried unusual things to cater to Japanese consumers' palates. Nestlé opened a factory last year in Japan to meet the growing demand for weirdly flavored KitKat bars. 
 
 Coke has dabbled in alcohol in the past, buying wine businesses in the US in the 1970s. That foray was widely seen as a failure, and it quit the wine industry a few years later. 
 
 Related: The world's most valuable liquor company is now Chinese 
 
 But CEO James Quincey has said the company needs to experiment beyond its classic soda brands. 
 
 Some drinks it created specifically for Japanese consumers have found success in other markets. 
 
 Few Americans have heard of Aquarius (a sports drink), Georgia Coffee (a canned coffee drink) or Sokenbicha (a blended tea drink), yet Coke says that each of those concoctions created for the Japanese market has generated global sales of $1 billion or more in the past five years. 
 
 Coke fans outside of Japan hoping for a stiffer drink from the company shouldn't get their hopes up, though. 
 
 "I don't think people around the world should expect to see this kind of thing from Coca-Cola," Garduño said of the planned "chu-hi" drink. 
 
 But in an interview with CNN last month, Quincey left open the possibility of introducing alcohol in the US one day. 
 
 "Never say never," he said.
– For 132 years, Coca-Cola has stuck to non-alcoholic beverages. No more. On Monday, the company introduced three fizzy lemon drinks in 3%, 5%, and 7% alcohol on the Japanese island of Kyushu, home to 13 million people. Coca-Cola's Lemon-Do falls into Japan's popular "chuhai" category, drinks that typically combine grain-based alcohol with flavored carbonated water, reports the Wall Street Journal. The canned beverage—in lemon, salty lemon, and honey and lemon flavors—will be slightly cheaper than the average chuhai, however, with a $1.50 price tag including tax. "We've started to experiment because, in the end, we are trying to follow the consumer. And, in the case of Japan, this is a relatively well-developed segment of low alcohol," Coca-Cola CEO James Quincey says, per the Journal. The brand hopes to appeal to female drinkers especially. Early testers seem impressed, comparing the drink to those made in bars. "I'm a bit surprised that this is a Coca-Cola brand," says a 59-year-old tester. "It's nice, but I would add a splash of grapefruit or more lemon to it." There are no plans to make Lemon-Do available outside of Japan, reports the BBC.