With Dublin Dr Pepper gone, the race is on to find it

by Teresa Gubbins

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Six-packs of the official stuff now start at about $30.

Stacy Breen

Cases of Dr Pepper with sugar, no "Dublin," at CostCo

Big Corporate America squashed the little guy on Wednesday when Dr Pepper Snapple shut down Dublin Dr Pepper Bottling Co. by buying their rights to distribute their soda.

The two entities had been embroiled in a lawsuit filed by Big Dr P to stop Dublin Dr Pepper from using the unauthorized "Dublin Dr Pepper" name and stop selling its product online.

Dublin Dr Pepper has cachet because its product is made with cane sugar; the stuff made by Dr P has icky high-fructose corn syrup. When regular Dr P went to HFCS, Dublin Dr Pepper stuck to cane sugar and became an underground hero. An I Support Dublin Dr Pepper Facebook page has more than 15,000 followers, there's a Boycott Big Dr P page, and Change.org is hosting a petition to persuade Big Dr P to relent.

After the announcement, Dublin Dr P laid off 14 of its 37 workers on Wednesday, but will continue doing business as Dublin Bottling Works Inc., bottling other sodas such as Triple XXX Root Beer, and maintaining its soda museum tourist stop.

Any time a product vanishes, its value increases -- even if, in this case, the only thing that's going away is a label. Dublin Dr Pepper has been bottled in Temple and is the exact same product as the $6 six-packs of cane-sugar Dr Pepper you can find at Tom Thumb, Central Market, and other stores. CostCo has cases for just under $15, about $3.75 a six-pack.

But there's already an instant collector's market for the Dublin version. Amazon has the six-pack of glass bottles for $53.95, or a bargain four six-packs for $99.

Longhorn General Store in the Fort Worth Stockyards ran out last week. The Corner Store in Grapevine still has six-packs which they'll let go for $100. Single bottles are $25, or $20 for an empty.

Chicken Express stores, which had been supplied with Dr Pepper syrup by Dublin Dr Pepper, still have it on their fountain, but once supplies run out, they'll go back to regular Dr Pepper.

Maple & Motor still has a little, but Soda Gallery -- whom you would think would have a stash? -- is sold out, says U.P.

Georgia's Farmers Market in old downtown Plano have been dutifully trucking out to Dublin to get Dublin-marked product all along. They have about 40 cases remaining: 20 in bottles, 20 cans. Price per six-pack as of 12 p.m. on Thursday: $35.

"We're still selling what we have," said employee Cameron Satterthwaite. "Of course, the price went up dramatically -- its value just skyrocketed over night because there is no more. It's completely dry out there in Dublin. But we'll sell whatever we have left. We're selling the six-packs for $35 and people are paying it. I've probably sold 10 to 20 cases already."