Arizona Iced Tea — Wholesale Supply

A pack that sells itself has to arrive intact

Nobody lists Arizona because of the tea. They list it because the can is identifiable from the far end of an aisle, and because it gives a convenience retailer a facing that promotes itself without a gondola end paid for behind it. That changes what a distributor is actually buying, and it changes how the stock has to be handled to be worth anything on arrival. Iguazu Trading supplies EU-market Arizona from Madrid as an independent trader in genuine stock, in the manufacturer's own sealed packaging.

Where the pack is doing the selling, its condition on arrival is not a cosmetic matter but a commercial one. A dented or scuffed outer has no value in a fixture whose entire proposition is standout, however good the liquid is. This is one of the few drinks lines where rejecting a delivery on appearance alone is the commercially correct call.

So the handling posture is different from a mainstream carbonate. Cases stay in the manufacturer's packaging and are never re-boxed. Pallets are built and wrapped to protect the outer cases rather than merely to hold the stack together, voids are filled so nothing shifts and abrades on a long leg, and the configuration is agreed before loading rather than improvised on the dock. If you need a load photo set before the doors close, ask for it on the booking and it will be recorded there.

Still tea inside a container built for carbonates

Here is a detail that catches out people who normally move fizzy drinks: there is no carbonation in this product. Fill a can with a carbonated liquid and the internal pressure stiffens the wall until the pack behaves almost structurally within a stack. A still tea gives you none of that. The footprint on the pallet is identical; the behaviour under load, and across the temperature swings of a long ocean crossing, is not.

So when a box carries both still teas and pressurised drinks, the order in which things are stacked stops being a detail. It is planned, with the still product placed where it is not supporting everything above it, and that plan goes into the pro-forma. The tall format sharpens the point, since its height against its diameter is not the ratio most beverage loading conventions were built around.

EU-market stock, American stock, and which one your label needs

This is an American brand that also runs a European operation, which means one trademark can reach you along two routes whose consequences diverge sharply. Product made for European markets carries the mandatory particulars and ingredient declaration that regime requires, and it circulates inside the customs union. Product carried across from the United States enters as an import from outside the customs union, dutied accordingly and labelled under a different rulebook, and it commonly needs over-stickering before any retailer will take it.

What we hold is the European version, and the offer says in writing which version is being sold against whatever has been allocated at that point. Where a broker needs a specific ingredient declaration to clear the entry, or a retail customer needs a particular language set, that belongs in the enquiry rather than in a phone call from the port. In markets that allow translation by sticker, expect the authority to look at the sticker as part of the label rather than as something added afterwards.

Writing the flavour spec so you get what your customer expects

Variant naming drifts from market to market on this brand, so a name that is perfectly clear in one country identifies nothing in particular in another. The green tea blend and the lemon do most of the moving, with the fruit blends behind them, and range is a large part of why the brand works at all — which is why opening with a single flavour is almost always the wrong build.

The dependable way to specify is to give us the wording printed on the pack you want plus the fill size, rather than a description of the flavour. What is obtainable depends on allocation, and the actual variants are put in writing at quotation. Most builds stack single-flavour layers into one mixed pallet, weighted toward the two that move, then get revised once a real sell-through report exists instead of being guessed at a second time.

Buy it as a block, not as a line

The customer for this is usually the one assembling an American or speciality import shelf: the city-centre convenience store, the forecourt or airport site, the grocer near a university. Shoppers who come in for one of those lines rarely leave with only one. If that describes your accounts, treat the brand as part of a block that ships on a single container, because a section that lands complete outperforms one that assembles itself over four quarters.

Within the chiller itself, Arizona sits at the visible, impulse end of the tea set rather than the everyday end. Buyers commonly run it above Lipton Ice Tea, which carries the mainstream volume, with Fuze Tea as a third tier where the fixture has the space, and add Monster Energy where the impulse shelf leans younger. The rest of the beverages range shows what else consolidates onto the same booking.

Quantities, terms and documents

Order sizes start at a case for a listing test and extend to full container loads on repeat supply, with pallets mixing brands and categories treated as routine. Loading is from Madrid, with Valencia at roughly 355 km and Barcelona at roughly 620 km as the deep-sea gateways, Algeciras as the transhipment alternative and Coslada as the rail option. We quote EXW Madrid, which is our premises rather than a port, plus FOB, CFR, CIF and DAP. Each consignment carries a commercial invoice, packing list, export declaration and transport document, with a Certificate of Origin, or a EUR.1 where the destination holds a preferential agreement with the EU and the goods qualify.