Kids Web Japan

The canned coffee and canned green tea that these companies worked so hard to develop can now be purchased from the vending machines found on just about every street in Japan. Vending machines used to offer only cold drinks. Then, in 1973, Pokka Corp., a drinks manufacturer based in Nagoya, developed the world's first vending machines capable of dispensing hot canned drinks. The cans are heated up inside the machine, making it possible for people to enjoy a hot drink anytime and anywhere.

A plastic bottle of hot green tea (ITO EN Ltd.)

Recently, other inventions have come along to make it even easier to enjoy hot drinks on the go. One problem with hot canned drinks is that when the drink inside the can is at just the right temperature for drinking, sometimes the can itself is too hot to handle. You might think that plastic bottles, like the small ones used for mineral water, would be a convenient solution. But the problem with plastic bottles is that they allow a small amount of oxygen to pass through to the drink. When oxygen passes through to a hot drink, it spoils the taste and quality of the drink. Ito En solved this problem in 2000 by coming up with a new kind of plastic bottle specifically for hot drinks. The new plastic does not allow oxygen to pass through. This invention has opened up a whole new world of possibilities for enjoying hot drinks on the go.