When did Brookdale Beverage close?

The Pieretti family sold it in 1987.

And, according to knowledgeable sources, the new owners obviously didn't know what they were doing or care, and it was gone in 1988.

Memories of Brookdale soda, 1976

I never drank milk except in coffee when I was a kid. That was back in the days when milkmen made house calls.

In our neighborhood on Gless Avenue in Belleville, New Jersey, we had strong young fellows who delivered our cases of 12-pack Brookdale soda bottles.

The men, strong and sure, gripped the cases, one in each hand and lugged our soda up the stairs to our second floor apartment. ...

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Copyright © 1976-2019 by Anthony Buccino. All rights reserved.

Ever lock yourself out of your car when picking up Brookdale Soda?

Anthony,

My family and I drank Brookdale soda for years. We lived in Bloomfield and used to drive over to the bottling plant near the Clifton border, grab a wooden case, and fill it up with large bottles. I vividly recall the day I locked the car keys in the trunk by accident when we were getting ready to leave. My father was angry, to say the least. He called my mother, who drove over and opened the trunk with her key. We always had Brookdale soda at family parties. I wish someone would bring that great soda back!

Bob Cianci

Our Facebook group has great photos

Here are pics from Bobby Cole's collection:

Check out the Brookdale Soda page on Facebook. You must be logged in to Facebook to view/join the group.

Baristanet and Brookale Soda

Although she grew up in Northern Virginia, novelist and Baristanet founder Debra Galant is hearing a lot of good things these days about growing up with Brookdale soda in those days.

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Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.
Look for the Brookdale Soda group on Facebook.com

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Scott checks in with memories of Brookdale soda

"...Hi.
I somehow stumbled across your site - WOW! Blast from the past!
I remember going to exchange the bottles @ Heller & Heller, someplace in Bloomfield, and someplace in Belleville near Newark I think.

When I was really young, I remember they even had a truck that did deliveries. I remember the bottles of soda stacked on the truck. NEAT to see the pictures.

If you're interested, Franklin Farms has an old Brookdale Soda Clock inside the store. Round, yellow and blue I think, and it still works! If you see him open, stop in and check out the time!

I think it's been there for 30 years and the guy who used to run the place was a distributor or a delivery guy - not sure, but there's a story there.

Its funny what you remember out of the blue sometimes. So many of my birthday parties as a kid had Brookdale sodas involved - for some reason I remember the lime - so bright green - and the fruit punch the most. They even had the plastic bottle tops to put on the bottle after it was opened. Kind of a translucent plastic I think. (I wonder if my parents have any at home?) If I come across any other Brookdale stuff, I'll keep you posted!

Thanks for running that blog! I put a link to it from the home page for now. I thought it would be neat for visitors to see other Belleville-related things too. Especially things that are no more.

Scott ... "

Edited from two separate emails from the same writer.

Copyright © 2009 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

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Grace Remembers The Flavorings

Grace reports in:

"...The extracts for that soda, the Black Cherry Pit, the Orange, the Cream and the Root Beer were manufactured by my grandfather, and father, I am the last descendant from that line.

I lived on Lake Street and went to Sacred Heart School.

Whenever I came home from school, the whole house smelled of cherry pit and still when I smell cherry I go back to my childhood.

My favorite candle to burn today is Black Cherry.

Sometimes when I’d come home from school in my little uniform with the knee socks and beanie, my grandfather would ask me to taste (imagine a six year old doing Human Factors) a new flavor he was experimenting with, some I liked others I did not, so your next "new" soda was in the hands (or flavor buds) of a 6 - 10 year old.

We also supplied many of the Italian Ice Stores you probably went to. It was a charmed life, no locked doors, playing in Branch Brook Park until dusk and sitting on the stoop with my friends.

Thanks for remembering...."