Dollar Tree Sells This Fancy Soda Brand For $1.25

Shoppers go to Dollar Tree to save money, and because everyone loves a bargain, that includes people in higher income brackets, too. The chain carries some brand-name items along with its own private label goods, but because the low prices are the draw, you don't really expect to find premium products on its shelves — like gourmet coffee brand Harry and David. However, there are some hidden gems, and one is gourmet craft soda from Sprecher Brewing Company.

Dollar Tree carries four flavors from Wisconsin-based Sprecher, including its flagship root beer, which the brand touts was named the top root beer in the U.S. by the New York Times. The others that Dollar Tree stocks are cream soda, grape, and orange dream, a citrus-vanilla soft drink. The brand's sodas are partially sweetened with Wisconsin honey, and it uses other local ingredients as well. They are "fire-brewed" in small batches in gas-fired kettles, a traditional process that caramelizes the sugars in the honey, creating a richer, more distinctive taste. Other premium touches that the ones sold by Dollar Tree have are Concord grape juice in the grape, real vanilla in the cream, and natural citrus flavors in the orange dream. You can also find charged lemonade (aka caffeinated sparkling lemonade) in original and strawberry by the brand. 

The 16-ounce bottles cost $1.25 each at Dollar Tree. The root beer and cream soda can also be ordered online, with a minimum order of 12 bottles for $15. The grape and orange dream are in-store only. By comparison, as of January 2026, Sprecher's sells the grape for $33.29 for a 12-bottle pack — more than double — which also works out to $2.77 each, and the other three are $30.59 for a dozen, which is $2.55 each.

Randy Sprecher began his brewing journey as a supervisor for beermaker Pabst. He went on to found his own company in 1985 in Milwaukee to make craft beer, which it still produces and fire-brews. He began making his company's first soda, root beer, soon after, so children would have something to drink on brewery tours while adults sampled the beer, and started selling it when it got a positive response. It's still made today with the secret recipe he created.

There are some 20 soda flavors in all, with some of the others including cherry cola, maple root beer, Puma Kola, black cherry, ginger ale, honeycrisp apple, Mt. Sprecher citrus, Ravin red cranberry cherry, and watermelon. The deeply flavorful drinks are worth using in more ways than just as a casual thirst-quencher, such as, perhaps unexpectedly, pairing them the right way with charcuterie. You can also use the celebrated root beer for Bobby Flay's tip of upgrading barbecued ribs with the fizzy drink, or "Harry Potter" fans can make delicious boozy butterbeer with the cream soda, and just two other ingredients, vanilla vodka and butterscotch schnapps — or vanilla and butter extracts to keep it non-alcoholic.

Randy Sprecher retired in 2020 and sold the now Glendale, Wisconsin-based company to a group of local investors. Sales have since tripled, and Sprecher has grown to have a 21% share of the craft soda market (per the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee).