Snapple

In response to Elmer Smith's upfront column, "KKK Ties To Snapple? it's Loony Idea": I share Mr. Smith's concern about the current popularity of "natural" products and society's tendency to ignore serious issues in favor of engaging in paranoid debate over issues that are in reality quite ridiculous. It troubles me that the furor over whether the presence of a ship and the letter "k" on the label mean that the Klan is behind the production of Snapple is given precendence over issues such as how the Food & Drug Administration defines what can be labeled as a "natural" product and why these products all seem to be more expensive than their "unnatural" counterparts, although the "natural" ones likely contain fewer ingredients since they are free of chemical additives.

EARLIER this month, the City of New York sold its soul to the highest bidder when it cut a deal that makes Snapple the official drink of the city. The $166 million deal allows Snapple to be the exclusive beverage vendor in city building and public schools. The city and the company will also promote each other in ads. This may seem like such a sweet deal that other cities are likely to follow suit, including Philadelphia. In fact, such an idea of corporate sponsorship was floated in City Council last year, during which Finance Director Janice Davis said that "Each of our citizens represents a potential market for these companies.

The summer of '96 has taught 21-year-old Joe Dombrowski a hard, cruel lesson: You cannot make people happy. Not even when you're giving them something for free. "You give them a cup; they want two-liter bottles, or T-shirts and hats, or they want to know, 'Why didn't my kid get one?' " Dombrowski said yesterday, working a block party on Duncannon Avenue in North Philadelphia. Dombrowski and his 22-year-old partner, John Nguyen, are men with a peaceful purpose - to give the denizens of the region a six-ounce taste of Cherry Coca-Cola, and a chance to play with one of the three Sega Saturns hitched up to a trailer behind the Cherry Coke van. In the process, they have been screamed at, spilled on, assaulted with horseshoes, and insulted by security guards.

One of the more amazing things about Elliott's Amazing Apple Juice is that, given the company's troubles in recent years, you can still find it on the shelves. If it had been just the embezzlement, that would have been sufficient. If it had been just the capping and bottling problems, that would have been sufficient. But there was also the great Snapple surge - and that may, in fact, be sufficient. Elliott's aficionados may want to stock up now on the beverage that has become a local institution, because Elliott's is suffering a tsoris that could be its last.

Murder defendant Morgan M. Mengel knew how to get what she wanted, and one of her longtime goals was to make her late husband "vanish," prosecution witnesses testified Wednesday. Mengel, a 36-year-old mother of three from West Goshen, is accused of conspiring with Stephen Shappell, her 22-year-old lover, to poison her husband, Kevin Mengel Jr., 33, on June 17, 2010. When an Internet recipe for lethal nicotine mixed into the victim's Snapple failed to work fast enough, Shappell fatally bludgeoned him, police said.

This sounds like the kind of stunt that rotten kids on a television show would pull: spike their teacher's Snapple with dog tranquilizer while she concentrates on grading papers. Only it wasn't television. It was a real-life eighth-grade classroom at St. Thomas Aquinas Elementary School on Route 13 in Croydon, Bucks County. Two kids plotted the sick stunt one morning last week. By recess, their 38- year-old lay teacher was feeling so poorly she went to the school nurse, complaining of headache and dizziness.

Days after hundreds of mourners memorialized a 33-year-old Chester County landscaper, his accused killers - his wife and her young lover - appeared in court this morning for their preliminary hearings. Authorities say Morgan Marie Mengel, 34, of West Goshen Township, conspired with Stephen M. Shappell, 21, formerly of Broomall, to kill Kevin Mengel Jr. on June 17. Shappell, who was represented by attorney Thomas Wagner, was an employee of Kevin Mengel's landscaping company, MKB Property Maintenance, a name created with the initials of each of the couple's three children.

LIFE IN THE '90S: When you have more people in jail than any other country on the globe, just how do you cope? Well, here's an Info Age idea they've come up with in two nervous little Connecticut towns blessed with nine penal institutions between them: The personal escape pager. In Cheshire, a New Haven suburb, residents pay a $30 deposit for a state- and town-financed beeper that will deliver a message up to 80 characters long in the event of a jailbreak emergency. In the town of Enfield, they gave out 74 free pagers to householders willing to participate in an escape-notification "telephone tree.

He's Frank Perdue, only handsomer. He's Sy Syms, only chattier. He's Sam Gerson, the latest chief-executive-cum-company-spokesman to hit the airwaves. Gerson, head of the Boston-based Filene's Basement chain, took to Philadelphia radio and television this week to introduce shoppers to its newest store, which opens today at 1608 Chestnut St. His is not a voice you could miss. Gerson's enthusiastic voice-overs combine the fervor of a discount-shopping convert with the klaxon tones of a New England native.

Murder defendant Morgan M. Mengel knew how to get what she wanted, and one of her longtime goals was to make her late husband "vanish," prosecution witnesses testified Wednesday. Mengel, a 36-year-old mother of three from West Goshen, is accused of conspiring with Stephen Shappell, her 22-year-old lover, to poison her husband, Kevin Mengel Jr., 33, on June 17, 2010. When an internet recipe for lethal nicotine mixed into the victim's Snapple failed to work fast enough, Shappell fatally bludgeoned him, police said.

Days after hundreds of mourners memorialized a 33-year-old Chester County landscaper, his accused killers - his wife and her young lover - appeared in court this morning for their preliminary hearings. Authorities say Morgan Marie Mengel, 34, of West Goshen Township, conspired with Stephen M. Shappell, 21, formerly of Broomall, to kill Kevin Mengel Jr. on June 17. Shappell, who was represented by attorney Thomas Wagner, was an employee of Kevin Mengel's landscaping company, MKB Property Maintenance, a name created with the initials of each of the couple's three children.

When the 21-year-old landscaper suspected of killing his boss in a suburban love triangle went on the lam Friday, he allegedly packed his getaway truck with clothes and maps. Unfortunately for him, he also brought along his cell phone. Police acknowledged Monday that they used the phone's signal to pinpoint Stephen M. Shappell in Denver over the weekend. Officers nabbed him as he walked from a motel late Sunday afternoon. The arrest occurred a day after investigators found the body of Kevin Mengel Jr., 33, decomposing in a field near Marple Newtown High School.

EARLIER this month, the City of New York sold its soul to the highest bidder when it cut a deal that makes Snapple the official drink of the city. The $166 million deal allows Snapple to be the exclusive beverage vendor in city building and public schools. The city and the company will also promote each other in ads. This may seem like such a sweet deal that other cities are likely to follow suit, including Philadelphia. In fact, such an idea of corporate sponsorship was floated in City Council last year, during which Finance Director Janice Davis said that "Each of our citizens represents a potential market for these companies.

'Now that she has broken up with Benjamin Bratt, who would you like to see Julia Roberts date next?" - People magazine online poll Dear Julia: Let me pitch you this concept: I am your next boyfriend. I'm balding, overweight and 41, an exotic combination, at least on your romantic r?sum?. I'm a married, stay-at-home dad with love handles and four belligerent children. You're one of the biggest stars in the world. We're perfect. I'm not vain or self-absorbed, which leaves me extra neurotic bandwidth to devote to you. But not too much.

On a typical day of practice for the Edgewood girls' tennis team, a bet is made. When the practice drills are complete, coach Jeff Mack makes the afternoon interesting for his players. He does not entice them with money or the promise of fewer wind sprints. He prefers something more valuable to an exhausted athlete on a hot afternoon. "We actually play for Snapples," Mack said, referring to the soft drink. Mack lines his team up on the baseline and tells the players that if anyone can get the ball by him, the drink is hers.

The beach in Wildwood - yes, the sand under your feet - will become one big commercial for Snapple beginning tomorrow. The Kozy Shack Pudding ads will start Memorial Day weekend. After balking at the idea last summer and then stolidly rejecting the idea of camel rides on the beach this spring, the Wildwood City Commission at last gave in to its honky-tonk roots and signed on with the Beach'n Billboard company, which each morning will imprint giant ads over and over again on the city's wide beaches.

The voice on the other end of the phone was unmistakable. "I'm BAAAACK!" brayed Wendy Kaufman, better known as Wendy the Snapple Lady, before breaking into a trill of delighted giggles. Fans practically know her story by heart - how a zaftig girl from Long Island started working in the beverage company's order department in 1991. How she quickly enlarged her responsibilities to include answering Snapple drinkers' letters. How she was discovered by its advertising agency in 1993.

The summer of '96 has taught 21-year-old Joe Dombrowski a hard, cruel lesson: You cannot make people happy. Not even when you're giving them something for free. "You give them a cup; they want two-liter bottles, or T-shirts and hats, or they want to know, 'Why didn't my kid get one?' " Dombrowski said yesterday, working a block party on Duncannon Avenue in North Philadelphia. Dombrowski and his 22-year-old partner, John Nguyen, are men with a peaceful purpose - to give the denizens of the region a six-ounce taste of Cherry Coca-Cola, and a chance to play with one of the three Sega Saturns hitched up to a trailer behind the Cherry Coke van. In the process, they have been screamed at, spilled on, assaulted with horseshoes, and insulted by security guards.