Lemonades | The fun drink knows no class boundaries

For several years now, a new promise has been appearing on refrigerated shelves: fun. Liquid, cool, stylized—and for everyone. Whether it's "Coke Zero" from the discount store, organic rhubarb spritzer in a hipster café, or the €4.49 elderflower-lime extract with a fancy label: this fun drink knows no class boundaries. It's the last democratic consumer good in a society that has otherwise long since fragmented into parallel worlds.

While real estate, healthcare, and even basic foodstuffs have increasingly become class issues , the flavorful beverage has remained. Despite rising prices, it's still accessible to almost everyone. It costs 79 cents, sometimes five euros—but it's there. At every gas station, every Rewe, every Späti (late-night shop). While housing , vacations, and even butter are suddenly becoming luxuries again, the fun drink might still be available. 250 milliliters of liquid escape at prices for every target audience.

Especially in times of inflation and creeping recession, this isn't trivial, but rather quite telling. When larger desires disappear— property , predictability, savings—consumption shifts to the smaller things. And the drink with character remains striking, affordable, and somehow comforting. And tasty, too. Perhaps the last wish one is allowed to have.

This fun drink has no barriers to entry, no price barriers, and no moral screening. No one asks if I "need" it. It doesn't inquire about my body mass index, my screen time, or my educational qualifications. I'm simply allowed. I can. And I can choose: lemon-salt soda, apple-cherry, or goji berry with ginseng.

What looks like a harmless thirst quencher is actually a cross-class code. While the political system struggles to organize participation , the choice of beverage functions like a minimal residual vote in crappy times: Here, I decide. Every day, anew. With or without carbonation. With sugar or with sweetener.

"Distinct everyday consumption" isn't a catchphrase here. Here, everyone still has access to everything. Mineral water with a hint of probiotics, orange soda with organic fruit, spritzers with seasonal produce—everything is lined up side by side on the shelf. And you can help yourself. It's a mini-utopia in the beverage cooler, sometimes with bulk discounts. You can indulge in fun drinks without getting your lid on. They're the civilized version of the formerly hated alcopops. Back then, these were publicly ostracized: too colorful, too cheap, too dangerous. The fun drink, on the other hand, is beyond suspicion. It's harmless enough to pass, but subversive enough to transcend social boundaries. And it doesn't require a youth protection debate.

In a world where everything has become unequal – income , opportunity, attention – the fun drink has become a rare symbol of horizontal participation. Sure, that's marketing too. But it's an offer that's not just open to capital owners. Fun drinks are perhaps the proxy solution for the desire for participation. A non-parliamentary solution, somewhere between sweetness and acidity. I can be broke or alone, but I can still drink fizzy water. Even in my increasingly uncertain everyday consumer life. Even when company is no longer a comfort.

Cheers! To one of the great choices of our time. It's not the solution, of course—but it's cold, and I often like it better than anything else going on.