7-Eleven Free Slurpee Day on 7/11: Can Dallas claim it?

DALLAS — This story was initially printed on July 11, 2018. It has been up to date for this 12 months’s 7-Eleven Day.

Dallas has no less than one icy concoction on its résumé.

When Mariano Martinez wished to enhance the consistency of the margaritas at his East Dallas Tex-Mex restaurant within the early Nineteen Seventies, he converted a soft-serve ice cream dispenser into the world’s first frozen margarita machine.

But can Dallas additionally claim the frozen concoction that supposedly inspired Martinez’s innovation?

The 7-Eleven Slurpee – which you can get free on Monday (7/11) – was born in 1965, in line with the Irving-based firm’s website. Back then, comfort retailer chain was owned by the Dallas-based Southland Corporation, which had opened the primary 7-Eleven in Oak Cliff.

So 7-Eleven was headquartered in Dallas when the Slurpee made its debut. Simple sufficient, proper?

Because that is extremely necessary, let’s clarify.

Slurpee is 7-Eleven’s model, trademarked and all, however the precise invention of the icy, sugary deal with traces again to Nineteen Fifties Kansas and a Dairy Queen proprietor named Omar Knedlik.

Knedlik, the story goes, had a damaged soda fountain, so he put bottles of the soda in a freezer to chill them off. When he pulled them out frozen, he served the icy drinks, and so they have been successful.

Knedlik then got here up with the concept for a machine that might produce the frozen drinks on demand, submitting for a patent for the machine in 1958. The patent described the machine’s product as a “novel carbonated beverage…involving a liquid and frozen particles and capable of retaining a uniform concentration during melting of the frozen particles.”

Knedlik ultimately got here up with a shorter title for the drink: ICEE.

You can nonetheless discover ICEEs everywhere, from Target shops to Burger Kings and gasoline stations. About 500 million ICEEs are offered yearly, according to the company.

But whereas Omar Knedlik had the concept for the ICEE, he did not construct the machine on his personal, and that is the place Dallas got here into play. Knedlik labored on the machine with Dallas-based producer John E. Mitchell, finishing it in 1965, according to Smithsonian Magazine.

A 7-Eleven supervisor in Dallas quickly picked up on the “strange new product,” according to the National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS). 7-Eleven then purchased a number of ICEE machines and struck a licensing take care of ICEE to promote the slushy product below a distinct title.

7-Eleven’s title for its model of the ICEE was self-explanatory.

“The first time I heard that sound through a straw, it just came out ‘slurp,'” Bob Stanford, the director of 7-Eleven’s in-house advert company advised NACS. “We added the two e’s to make a noun. It was just a fun name and we decided to go with it.”

7-Eleven made probably the most of that preliminary licensing take care of ICEE. The firm recorded a not-quite-Grammy-worthy tune in regards to the Slurpee within the Nineteen Seventies and dozens of commercials through the years. Oh, and you understand that feeling you get while you drink a Slurpee too quick? They trademarked that, too.