There are two beverages that I would be hard pressed to live without. Tea and Diet Coke. I love tea, but I’m addicted to Diet Coke. I drink the 20 ounce plastic bottles from vending machines at work and cans at home. Even though I recycle, I often feel guilty at the number of bottles and cans that I go through in a week. For this reason, I happily accepted the offer to review the SodaStream Fountain Jet soda maker. I was eager to see if the machine would offer fountain style taste and if it would help me save money and reduce can usage at home.
SodaStream sent me the Fountain Jet Starter Kit along with a selection of their soda mixes and favored water drops.
Package Contents
Fountain Jet soda maker
110 Liter carbonator gas cylinder
2 1 liter bottles with caps
User manual
The starter kit does not come with any soda mixes, so you’ll need to buy them separately. They are priced at $3.99 – $4.99, with quite a few flavors (20-30) to choose from, including diet and non-diet flavors. Since I am diabetic, I requested samples of the diet mixes and was sent Diet Cola, Diet Root Beer, Diet Creme Soda, Diet Cranberry Rasberry, and others. The diet mixes use Splenda. They also sent me some of their non-diet mixes and I was surprised that they are also made with a mixture of Sucrose and Splenda.
The machine itself is made of plastic and is relatively light weight. It stands 16.7 tall, and just barely fits under my kitchen cabinets.
I was a little worried that the process to make drinks would be more trouble than it would be worth. I’m happy to report that my worries were completely unfounded. I am not sure how much easier this system could be…
To get started, you remove the back cover on the soda machine.
This is where the included carbonator gas cartridge will be installed.
Just unscrew the protective plastic cap from the top and then…
Screw it into the fitting on the back of the Fountain Jet and snap the cover back into place.
Open a soda mix flavor that you want to use and fill the cap full of the syrup.
Then wash one of the included liter bottles. FYI: The bottles can not be washed in a dishwasher… Then fill the bottle to the fill mark with cold water. I always keep a Brita filter pitcher in my refrigerator, so this is what I use to fill the bottle.
The bottle then screws into the threaded fitting on the front of the Fountain Jet.
The top part of the Fountain Jet can swivel out to make it easier to screw in the bottle.
Here we see the filled bottle of water installed in the SodaStream ready to be carbonated.
To release the gas from the carbonator cartridge into the water bottle, you just press the large Grey button on the top of the Fountain Jet in short firm bursts. The first few times you press the button, you’ll hear and see gas release into the bottle, but you have to keep pressing till you hear a loud buzz. Once you press the button and hear a buzz, you press it two more times and you’re done. Swivel the bottle out, unscrew it, pour in the cap full of soda mix syrup, screw on the bottle cap and shake the bottle gently back and forth a couple of times to mix the syrup and that’s it.
The carbonator cartridge that comes with the Fountain Jet starter kit is supposed to create up to 110 liters (bottles) of soda. New cartridges cost $21.99 and require that you return the used cartridge. If you don’t return it, you will be charged an additional $15.00 fee. Thankfully, a return shipping label and box are provided to make the return more convenient.
One bottle of Diet Root Beer ready to drink.
I’m curious if anyone has caught on to the fact that The Fountain Jet does not require any batteries or electricity to work. I know that I was a bit surprised when I unpacked the contents and did not see an AC adapter.
I’ve made five liters of soda with the Fountain Jet so far and I have liked all the flavors except the Diet Cream Soda which was a bit too sweet for me (even though it’s diet). The Diet Cola is surprisingly good and tastes more like Diet Coke than Pepsi. Which is good because I don’t care that much for the flavor of Pepsi. You can also use the MyWater flavors with the Fountain Jet to make sparkling water aka seltzer water. I tried the Berry flavor and it wasn’t something I’d probably try again. I’d rather have the more flavorful flavors.
The one liter bottles have been the perfect size to share with another person during a meal or with a snack. The bottles keep the fizz in the drinks even if you don’t drink them all in one sitting.
We’ve established that the Fountain Jet is easy to use and makes good tasting sodas, but is it economical? Here are the consumables:
$21.99 per 110 liter carbonator = ~ .20 cents a liter
$4.99 per soda mix (makes 12 liters or 50 servings) = ~ .42 cents a liter
That works out to a cost of about .62 cents per liter. Let’s use Diet Coke as a comparison. The prices that I’m going to quote are local for me here in Columbus, Indiana at the time of this review. The 12pk can and 2 liter prices are sale prices for a local grocery store.
$4.00 for a 12pk of 12 ounce cans (works out to ~ .94 cents per liter)
$1.25 for a single 20 oz bottle (works out to about $2.11 per liter)
$1.00 for a 2 liter bottle (.50 cents a liter)
It appears that the SodaStream Fountain Jet does save you money when compared to buying cans or individual bottles. But it does not save you any money when you compare to buying a 2 liter bottle. That said, I don’t normally buy 2 liter bottles because I usually only drink about half of it before it goes flat. That is one of the advantages to using the Fountain Jet to make 1 liter bottles, I find that I don’t waste as much. Another advantage is that I don’t have to lug and store multiple 12 and 24pk boxes of cans. So for me, this product gets two thumbs up. I’ll write an update to the review after my first experience exchanging carbonation cartridge.
Updates 05/20/15
I used the SodaStream for awhile after I posted the review, but then stopped using it for a few reasons. The first reasons was that I didn’t really have room to keep it out on my counter top all the time. I could have put it in a cabinet, but storage space in my kitchen is at a premium. Another reason why I stopped using it is because I didn’t want the hassle of getting new CO2 tanks. But the main reason why ulitmately I stopped using the SodaStream Fountain Jet is that I no longer want to drink drinks with artificial sweeteners like Aspartame. These days I still make my own soft drinks, but I do it a different way. I buy 2 liter plain seltzer from Kroger for less than a $1 each. I add two packets of stevia sweetener and mix with a tiny bit of regular water. I add Capella flavored drops to the stevia/water mixture and then pour seltzer into the same glass, mix and add ice. Our favorite flavors are grape and wild cherry.
Source: The sample for this review was provided by SodaStream. Please visit their site for more info.
Product Information
| Price: | $89.99 |
| Manufacturer: | SodaStream |
| Pros: |
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| Cons: |
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This looks pretty cool – seems like something good for experimenting with flavors, too, since you could try mixing and matching syrups. I wonder if you can use regular soda syrup found at places like Costco and Sam’s Club, or if the soda-to-water ratio is different with those.
How does the carbonation compare to drinks from a regular soda fountain at a fast food restaurant? I generally like fountain soda better than stuff from a can or bottle – it seems crisper and fizzier to me.
@Claire The fizziness with the Fountain Jet is great I think. And if you want more fizz, you just press the button a couple of extra times.
$21.99 for 33gm of co2 is the outrageous part here! The threading of the co2 cylinder seems to be different from standard paintball cylinders locking you into their refilling service plus the non-green aspect of shipping cylinders back and forth (If the manufacture reads this I hope they understand that this stuff leads to bad karma). A bit of googling turns up http://www.sodaclubrefill.com which has products to aid in refilling the cylinders either yourself (I have 2 10# co2 cylinders for the beer kegerator anyway) or by a willing local paintball shop via a adapter to the standard WGA-ASA threading. Skipping the math, my 10# co2 cylinder would refill the 33gm cylinder about 130 times making the co2 cost go from $.20/liter to $.0015/liter which would make the system cheaper than even a $1 2-liter bottle.
Oops my bad, the co2 cans from SodaStream are 33 oz not 33 gram, still it gets your co2 cost down to about $.04 per liter. And that is assuming it costs 21.99 to fill a 10# cylinder, in reality it would likely cost half that.
@Chris Thanks for the idea about trying to find an alternative filling option for the cylinders. I’ll give that some thought.
I have a colleague that has one of these. She has stopped buying pop at all. Now we only ever see the 1 liter bottle on her desk. She likes the diet Dr. Pepper equivalent.
I have tried a couple flavors and just a word of warning to non-diet pop drinkers, you can taste the splenda. I guess you would get used to it.
My wife is a huge fan of fizzy water and we were going through a 12 pack of seltzer/week if not more. I looked into DIY methods e.g. http://www.truetex.com/carbonation.htm and SodaClub. It looks like the DIY methods are a couple of orders of magnitude cheaper in the long run (if you’re just doing seltzer, we don’t do sodas with syrups). However, the DIY methods have a distinct “science project” aesthetic to them, and we decided to go with the SodaClub Penguin. We really like it so far, though it is a bit more expensive than the basic sets.
My favorite fizzy drink now is from QT and is a fizzy green tea with berry flavor. I make it at home with bottled seltzer water and those little single packets of tea mix. I’ve been thinking about a home seltzer maker for this and the diet Dr Pepper my wife drinks.
I’ll have to look into this!
I have to say I thought sodastream had gone bust years ago. This is the first one I have seen in a long time. I am going to go and do a little research into their prices in England now. I drink about 4 litres of soda water a day and it would be very handy to find an alternative to filling up the shopping trolley every time I go to the supermarket.
Wow, Soda Stream – this brings back so many memories. I used to love this as a kid. That smell of the carbonated water as you unscrewed it from the machine, dropping Vimto into it and watching it fizz up …
Hmmm, might well invest in one of these myself!
@Kev – LG What is Vimto?
RO:
If you go to Boots the Chemist they still stock Soda Stream Machines and all the necessaries =)
Julie:
Vimto is a mixed fruits based sparkling beverage, very tasty!
This looks very similar to Soda Club http://www.sodaclub.com. We have one and…
1. It’s very easy to use, but get used to keeping the dedicated liter bottles of water in your fridge.
2. It makes great Club Soda.
3. The taste of the sodas is ehh. We’ve tried them all and some are “ok” others are well…like the really cheap no-brand stuff from the grocery store.
4. The bottles needed to be replaced once a year.
5. You can’t easily use other soda syrups as the mixture ratio isn’t the same (we tried with Coke syrup).
We have the Soda Club as well. Love it.
A couple of tips:
1) you can save on the CO2 by letting the device buzz once and then leaving the bottle screwed in for a minute
2) try soda water + frozen juice concentrates 😉
Regarding the comment on delivery, I think that they have some sort of local delivery person so the canisters are probably transported in bulk. When I order refills, I am instructed to leave the canisters out where they can be seen. Within a few days they are replaced with my order.
I drink a lot of soda water…and where I live, since the tap water is generally blechh, unsweetened soda water is a huge seller by the liter in plastic or 12 packs in cans. My wife bought me the Soda Club Penguin for my birthday this year. I drink an average of 5 liter bottles a day. I don’t have to haul cans from the store and back to the redemption center. UPS will take the ship-back empties and I bike right past a UPS shipping center on my way to work. Simple, easy, great. We use the glass bottles. I’m not a big fan of the flavored sodas (not a big fan of diet or non-diet commercial sodas either)…but find them decent. The big thing for me is not having to haul sacks of cans to the redemption center. One of the nicest and most practical gifts I’ve ever received.
I also am addicted to Diet Coke–however the only reason I drink it is for the caffeine. This may be a stupid question but, is the caffeine content in these DIY drinks similar to standard diet coke? When I worked in an outside office I was able to to easily feed my addiction, however, I work from home now and the DIY systems look very appealing to me.
Finally!
I had a sodastream as a kid in the UK (the bottles were heavy glass then and only held about 12oz, but you CO2 cylinders look about the same size (they were painted steel then, not aluminum…) I grew up drinking straight up soda water, or sometimes we would add some apple juice concentrate. For years I’ve wondered why they didn’t have them here…
Soda Stream is a great party trick. The loud “buzz” really freaked out my co-workers. I take it to work whenever we get a new employee, and everyone else gathers ’round to watch.
Favorite flavor is diet cola mixed with diet cream soda. Tastes similar to vanilla diet Coke from Sonic.
How come you don’t mix the syrup in the water before carbonating?
@Famous Because the instructions tell you to do it afterwards 😉 Also, the nozzle to carbonate the water goes down into the bottle / liquid.
Hello,
I recently purchased an adapter from sodaclubrefill.com and want to share the terrible experience that I had there.
I ordered their valve on May 20 and it was reported as back-ordered several weeks later. I recently received a valve that I thought would allow me to refill my existing Soda Club tanks with a standard co2 station. However, I found that this was not possible and I would need another $50 adapter from sodaclubrefill.com. I checked the website and found that the text describing the product I had ordered had been updated to clarify this since then, but that text was not their when I ordered. Furthermore, the product was incorrectly linked to a different product that is actually $60 more and would allow refill through standard tanks.
I politely pointed this out to the website contact and asked for a refund. He was extremely rude and insulting but said that he would still issue a refund when he received the returned item. Thus, I returned the item. Now, the merchant has suddenly changed his mind and, in a slew of insults, told me that he will not issue the refund because I am an “illiterate idiot” and a “punk” for telling people about my problems with the valve on review sites. Please keep in mind that my tone was always professional and I never insulted anyone. His insults came as a complete surprise.
I would suggest that if anyone considers doing business with this website, please pm me for details and I can send you copies of the incredibly rude emails sent to me.
What “lucrece” neglected to mention was the demanding and extortive tone to her emails. We do NOT succomb to extortion or vile demands, all due to Ms Lucrece Borrego’s inability to comprehend detailed product information.
In spite of her unnecessary threats and toxic demands, we gave her the benefit of the doubt by offering her a refund. Instead of accepting this offer and writing the incident off as a simple consumer misunderstanding, she proceeded to libel our good name in this and many other forums for the sole malicious purpose of harming a good business. It is lamentable that Ms. Borrego’s acts are one of the root causes for most consumer prices to skyrocket and make it impossible for small business people to conduct an honorable business.
Our satisfied customers on our website and user forum are indicative of the quality and care we take in producing a product.
It is unfortunate that Ms. Borrego’s extortive techniques will only fail and serve no other purpose other than to illustrate her immaturity which is commensurate with her young age. Please take the time to stop by our website at sodaclubrefill.com and see for yourself that we have a great product that can save you alot of money on CO2 Refills.
Ms. Borrego should focus on honing her social skills instead of advertising her vile disregard for common courtesy and human interaction.
My wife and I recently purchased the Sodastream fountain jet and we love it! We purchased the fountain jet at Kohls for $99.00 and they also sell a few flavors of the syrups for $4.89 each. As for the CO2 cylinders, the 60L size are available at our local Williams-Sonoma store. We bought one extra cylinder and when one runs out, we just run over and exchange the empty one for a full one. Part of the fun for us has been mixing various syrups and juices. The sodas are fresh and you control the amount of flavoring and carbonation you use. When we figured out our costs, we figured it was cheaper than 2 liter bottles unless, they were available for less than .80 cents a bottle.
At any rate, we recommend them wholeheartedly.
Hey everyone. I dont know who writes these reviews, but the sodas dont taste half as good as real soda.
@Concerned Citizen I guess it’s a matter of taste-buds. To me they taste good. They don’t taste exactly like a name brand soda, but pretty close. My favorite is probably the diet rootbeer. Were you drinking the diet drinks or the regular drinks?
Before ordering Soda Stream’s Fountain Jet, if I wanted a low-carb soda sweetened with Splenda instead of Aspartame, I had to travel past my nearby Walgreen’s and Safeway over to Lucky and pray they had Pepsi One or Diet Zero in stock. Cola. That’s all. Everything else has Aspartame.
Now? Variety! Splenda-sweetened diet variants of Coke, Dr. Pepper, Fresca, Sprite, Crush, A&W Root Beer, lemonade, and so much more. No wasted time, no lugging 2-liters, far less plastic waste, I control the amount of carbonation and flavor. Easy to set up and use, quick delivery.
If I find any drawbacks, it’s the “loud buzz” that signals adequate carbonation; it’s not so much a “buzz” as the sound of flatulence. (Hope the neighbors don’t hear!)
And I hope they come up with a diet version of their cherry cola soon!
i just got mine and i am having trouble getting it to work right. i dont like the taste of the drinks that came with it. could be i am just doing it wrong. i never hear a Buzz. do you have to hold it down for a long time to hear this buzz? i am ready to send it back a this point as i am not getting what i thought was a soda. any ideas would be helpful.
@debbie You don’t have to hold the button down a long time, but you might not be pressing it enough times. Keep pressing and letting up until you hear the initial buzz. Then press it 2 more times and it should be good to go.
thanks i actually sat back and watched a video showing how to do this and i was doing it all wrong. i actually got it to work. i am not fond of the flavors. but i am hoping that juice will be great with this.
thanks for responding
Soda isnt good for you anyway. Youre getting ripped off on the co2 injector, the co2 itself and the syrups. Im in NJ. If you want soda,, i can get twevle pack on sale for $2.50 sometimes. The no name brands are this price regularly and sometimes cheaper.You know what my kids and i drink? Water. I have nice Britta water filter. Nothing to recycle.
Thanks for the review. Are you thinking about doing a follow-up?
I am looking at getting one and would love to hear your long-term impressions.
Thanks
@travis Well to be honest, it ended up in my closet. It’s not that I don’t like the taste of the sodas. I do. But it is easier to buy several 12 packs of Diet Coke when they are on sale and put a bunch in the fridge.
I don’t think anyone mentioned that you can make your flavors and make them as sweet, or not as you like.
When I used to make and bottle my own soda pop I always shorted the sugar. It made it more refreshing and I liked it better.
Another advantage is that you could use stevia as the sweetner and its glycemix index is 0.
Your math is correct IF you consider only purchasing the flavors that cost $4.99.
when in fact if you are ordering online as of today Jan 25 2011. the majority of flavors cost more than $5. only 15 flavors cost that much. while 23 flavors cost $7 and 8 flavors currently or will do or will cost $10. that brings the average cost to $6.87 per 12 liters, not $4.99
Also $4 is about what a person would pay if they buy name brand 12 pack soda at regular retail prices. but I would equate soda stream’s do it yourself soda more to that of generic brand sodas like Kroger or Publix or Walmart. which cost about $2 to $2.75 a 12 pack. lets average and round that up to $2.38 a pack
making the sodas $.20 a piece, not $.33.
even if you use name brand sodas I pretty much always see them on sale for 2 12 packs for 6 or 7 bucks. not $4 a piece.
With MY lol analysis done, I conclude that you are still correct. you would still save money with soda stream even buying generic brands in a can (but not much). but if a family usually buys 2 liters at a little over a dollar (or around $.70 generic) you would save more money by continuing to purchase 2 liters rather than making your own using soda stream.
lastly unless a family is very large or drinking extremely large amounts of soda (the amounts that any doctor would call unhealthy) I would call this a money saver, but not a big one
pros
-cheaper than normally buying 1 liters from convenience stores or cans
-do not have to carry cases or large bottles home.
-no need for a lot of storage for bottles or cans
now the other cons
-$100 or so out the box to order the system
-the inconvience of only having one liter of soda at a time ready, unless you purchase more bottles at 5 bucks a pop.
I would rate this product a D+ for the average soda consumer and a B- for those who consume a lot of soda.
Wow, Soda Stream, how 1970’s retro! My childhood memory of over-carbonating the drinks in the machine then the drink exploding over the place! Wondered what my parents did with the soda-stream machine after about two summers of use? Probably to the same consignment as other kitchen gimmicks.. 😉
Pay less for a machine, pay 4 cents/liter to make seltzer, includes a free mister. See the My Pop Old Fashioned oda Shoppe. Go to http://www.mypopsoda.com
To the person who asked “How come you don’t mix the syrup in the water before carbonating?”
I made that mistake, once. Poured some syrup in and forgot I hadn’t carbonated it yet. Though “Well, why not?” and fizzed it up. When I unscrewed it from the machine, soda everywhere. 🙂 No harm done though.
@SodaClubRefil.com regardless of the customer’s demands or angry emails, you should learn how to do business. “The customer is always right” clearly means nothing to you. It sounds like you would rather berate a customer on some online blog than do business in a proper manner. I see nothing in her post here that would indicate that she is anything other than reasonable. I have no read other posts from her elsewhere or the emails that you reference, but as a consumer I can empathize with her. If you order something only to have the product description change later, who’s really at fault? This is the first review I have read of your product, but due to your reaction and general attitude, I will not order your product. I would rather pay more from a faceless corporation than risk shady practices and rudeness from another. Thank you for your reply here, it was eye opening and very informative.
I feel the same way Terry! O wad going to Logos today to purchase this machine, but before I walked out the door, I thought I would read some reviews. After reading what a COMPANY spokesperson replied to a person who just wanted a refund, I will NOT be purchasin this product, or any other product from this company. The customer is always right. I too saw nothing offensive in this persons request for a refund. Sounds like the spokesperson @sodarefil.com has anger management issues.
It seems to me that some commenters are confusing the SodaStream product being reviewed here with a third-party company called SodaClubRefills. A commenter named Chris mentioned SodaClubRefills, and then others commented on their experiences with that company. I get an error when I try to go to SodaClubRefills now.
I would never order this product after reading the hostile response from a company spokesman. No matter the issue, I would never purchase from a company who responded in this tone. Very unprofessional.
I am thinking about buying a soda machine for my husband and sister for Christmas…. Soda Club will NOT be the product I buy. I want to give my family a fun and useful gift and not hassles from the customer service reps. If anyone has other suggestions please let me know!
For those of you getting self-righteous about the comment left by the representative – as someone already mentioned, the comment does not seem to be by an actual SodaStream/Soda Club employee but by a third-party company called Soda Club Refills. If you do a Google search, their website comes up but one gets an error. Try it yourself: http://www.sodaclubrefill.com/. You can also follow the link from the nearly three-year-old comment. It’s broken and it does not link to the SodaStream website.
And really…is one representative going to put you off from buying a product you like? I have had negative interactions with ONE customer service representative from many of the services I use (my phone provider, my university, etc.) That doesn’t mean that the service is overall bad or that the product is a bad one. It just means there’s one nasty representative who may not be keeping their job for very long.
I’m curious why the cost analysis’ I’ve been reading don’t take into account the intitial investment of $80-$100 or more. It’s absolutely essential. I can buy 24 oz 6 packs of my favorite soda for around $4.00 on the high end, $2.50 on sale. My own realistic costs analysis shows me I’d still be paying just over $1.50/ltr after 240 ltrs of soda accounting for the soda flavors at $4.99 and CO2 refills at $15.00. It would take years to get to the point where this homemade soda cost even the same as my favorite national brand. It’s disappointing, I was looking forward to buying one.
Just to clarify, I’d be paying over $1.05/ltr after 240 ltrs, not $1.50. I pay half of that now for my favorite.
Thank you for this review! I’m excited about this and I appreciate you doing the math. That’s super helpful.
Are you sure about this math?
$21.99 per 110 liter carbonator = ~ .20 cents a liter
$4.99 per soda mix (makes 12 liters or 50 servings) = ~ .42 cents a liter
Isn’t it .2 dollars a liter and .42 dollars a liter? Forgive my misunderstanding if I’m wrong, but I think you’re off by two decimal places.
I am very happy with my Fountain Jet; I have a few medical conditions that require that I stay hydrated. I backed off from a 2+ Liter-a-day Coca-Cola habit several years ago. I like Crystal Light and the various Store-Brand knock-offs well enough, but I prefer sparkling beverages. I have an insulated, 2-Liter “Bubba Keg” mug that I drop in an envelope of Drink mix and 2 Liters of SodaStream Carbonated water.
I plan to investigate the SodaMod Adapter which is NOT made by the company mentioned in previous postings. It will allow me to use much less expensive-to-buy and -refill Paintball CO2 Tanks.
http://www.amazon.com/SodaMod-SodaStream-Soda-Club-CO2-Adapter/dp/B00CU0E73O/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1378425461&sr=8-7&keywords=SodaStream
When I get it, I will let you know how it works out, but Amazon shows mostly good reviews.
@OCMichael Are you talking about the Fizzgiz? I tried it and was not impressed. The caps don’t work with any of the bottles I tried and the paintball CO2 tubes made the water taste like oil.
I love the sodastream..the only problem? I forget to buy the syrups 🙂 But it’s fantastic, not just cost wise, but my favorite element is that it is so eco-friendly. Honestly, I like the flavors as well as, if not more than store bought soda flavors. You can also carbonate water, so that’s cool, my son drinks more water now.