While sparkling water and soda increasingly serve as a base for flavor exploration in beverages, RTD can tea deliver on novel and nostalgic flavor combinations coveted by Gen Z and Millennial consumers, according to Blodin Ukella, founder of RTD tea brand Ryl Tea Company.
The company entered a multi-year partnership with The Hershey Co., launching Ryl Tea x Jolly Rancher RTD tea last month. For Ryl Tea, the collaboration is less about a single product launch and more about rethinking where tea fits in a rapidly evolving beverage landscape – and how confectionery can help drive consumer engagement.
The collaboration “demonstrates that modern tea can be a highly flexible innovation platform,” and “consumers are increasingly open to unexpected cross-category collaborations when the execution feels authentic and product-led,” Ukella said.
That flexibility, along with creativity, is increasingly important as brands blur traditional food and beverage lines. Confectionery players, in particular, are pushing beyond the candy aisle – extending into formats like frozen novelties – as familiar flavors translate into new usage occasions. Within that context, Ryl’s move into candy-flavored tea reflects a broader cross-category intersection built on recognizable taste, brand equity and nostalgia.
Ukella says RTD tea has roughly 81% household penetration, where the category is driven by a older demographic – Gen X and Boomers – who grew up with the legacy products. Yet, Ryl Tea aims to meet Gen Z and younger millennials to “bring in that incremental drinker” looking for flavor-forward, experiential beverages, he said.
Confectionery trends: Balancing better-for-you trends and indulgence
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Nostalgia and novelty become a flavor strategy for Gen Z and Millennials
To meet younger consumers who are embracing 90s culture and skeptical of traditional marketing, the company is leaning into nostalgia – not as a gimmick, but as an entry point.
“Nostalgia is one of the most powerful purchase drivers in beverage right now, especially with younger consumers,” Ukella said. “They’re gravitating toward flavors and brands that connect them to a specific moment in time, and Jolly Rancher is one of the most universally recognized flavor experiences in American confectionery.”
Jolly Rancher’s iconic Blue Raspberry, Green Apple and Cherry flavors are more than taste profiles.
“These aren’t just candy flavors anymore, they’re flavor ‘languages’ that Gen Z and millennials immediately understand and have an emotional connection to from childhood,” he added.
A collab shaped by permissible indulgence
While Jolly Rancher is an indulgent treat, Ukella says the collaboration is shaped by the rise of permissible indulgence, where consumers simultaneously expect enjoyment and health in their treats.
“Our view is that ‘better-for-you’ and ‘indulgent’ aren’t opposites. … They want products that taste incredible and fit how they want to live,” he added.
For Ryl, the intersection of healthy treating defines the brand’s product philosophy.
“We’re not asking consumers to choose between fun and better-for-you. We’re giving them a tea that lets them have both in the same can. That’s the white space, and that’s where Ryl plays,” he explained.
Designing a clean label, candy-forward tea
Translating that idea into an actual beverage required careful formulation, particularly given the recognition of Jolly Rancher flavors.
“Balancing bold fruit flavor with brewed tea notes, while also maintaining a clean, zero-sugar profile, required a great deal of formulation work,” Ukella said. “We collaborated closely with the Jolly Rancher team for many months to ensure the flavors felt true to the Jolly Rancher flavor profile without becoming overly sweet or artificial tasting.”
The final result is a zero-sugar, five-calorie beverage containing natural flavors and sweetened with a blend of stevia leaf extract, allulose, steviol glycosides and monkfruit extract that pulls Jolly Rancher’s familiar flavors forward rooted in a tea experience.
“It can be an everyday drink, not an occasional treat,” for novelty-seeking Gen Z consumers, nostalgic Millennials and health-conscious shoppers, Ukella said.
Standing out in the legacy tea aisle
Ryl is not trying to win share within the category, rather it is trying to expand it.
“We don’t really see ourselves competing in the traditional RTD tea set, and that’s by design,” Ukella said. “The legacy tea aisle is crowded with brands fighting over the same consumer who’s already buying tea … Trying to win share point by share point in that fight isn’t where the future of the category is.”
Instead, the brand’s strategy is to compete on usage occasion, targeting consumers who might choose energy drinks, modern sodas, flavored sparkling water or a functional beverage. These choices, Ukella says, are shaped by flavor, brand and cultural relevance instead of “category convention.”
“Ryl Tea Jolly Rancher gives that consumer a reason to walk into the tea aisle, often for the first time. That’s incremental volume for the category, not stolen share,” he explained.
Retail performance will ultimately determine whether that strategy works. “Velocity and repeat at retail are the most important signals … trial gets you on the shelf, but repeat is what tells you the product is delivering,” Ukella said.
The company is closely monitoring who is buying the tea, along with what other products they’re buying , according to Ukella.
More than novelty: Redefining tea
Still, the launch is not intended as a short-lived novelty.
“The bigger shift underneath this launch is that the old definitions of ‘healthy’ and ‘indulgent’ are collapsing for the younger consumer,” he said.
In that sense, Ryl Tea’s Jolly Rancher collaboration is less about adding candy flavors into tea and more about redefining what tea can be.
“We’re not putting a candy flavor on a tea to chase a trend; we’re using one of the most iconic flavor experiences in America to demonstrate what modern beverage can look like: Bold, fun, emotionally resonant, and zero sugar,” Ukella said.
“In many ways,” he added, “the Ryl Tea Jolly Rancher launch is a reflection of where we believe the category is going, and we’re building Ryl to lead that shift.”
