When The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives premiered in September 2024, viewers were treated to a glimpse inside the chaotic, less-than-holy lives of Salt Lake City’s TikTok-famous Mormon moms. The ladies backstabbed and gossiped, spread swinging rumors, and instigated friendship breakups, all while posting many an ill-advised TikTok dance. But instead of being fueled by alcohol like so many of the narrative arcs on reality television, the drama on Mormon Wives sprang from sobriety — and perhaps a minor sugar high. As they worried about the end of #MomTok and discussed modern Mormonism, the women abided by their religious strictures and forwent coffee and alcohol in favor of gigantic 40-ounce megamugs of sugary sweet liquid, procured at local soda shops like Swig and FiiZ. Welcome to the era of dirty soda.

What is dirty soda, you may be wondering? Isn’t all soda a little dirty? Sure, soda is full of chemicals, sugar and dyes — and by almost all accounts, it’s pretty much terrible for you — but a dirty soda elevates the unhealthy quotient to another level. Take a regular soda and add sugary syrups and flavorings, creams, and a squeeze of fruit juice, and you have yourself a dirty soda, a beverage so supremely unvirtuous that it may as well be a beer. (But it’s not, which, for the Mormons, for whom alcohol is forbidden, is the whole point.) If a Diet Coke is a fridge cigarette — a naughty indulgence — a dirty soda is a whole pack chain-smoked. Born in the Mountain West, it is a quintessentially American beverage: After all, what could possibly be more American than taking something unhealthy and making it even unhealthier?

Becca Mills, a former teacher from Minneapolis who runs the food blog Fork in the Kitchen, says that although she’d heard of dirty soda before, she has noticed an increase in popularity since Mormon Wives debuted. After watching the show herself, she posted a few of her favorite homemade dirty-soda recipes on her blog over the summer.

“I have a passion for making homemade simple syrups, and that transpires into coffee drinks a lot, so I was just like, ‘Well, I always have simple syrups in my fridge, why don't I make a fun drink with it and try it?” Mills tells Yahoo. “It's kind of weird, but the appeal is there — it’s kind of creamy and sweet and bubbly. So it just kind of turned into a fun little side project.”

While the women of Mormon Wives may have helped usher dirty soda into the mainstream, it’s long been a trend in Utah, where entrepreneur Nicole Tanner started the first dirty-soda concept shop, Swig, in St. George. Since its launch in 2010, Swig has expanded to 151 stores in 15 states, trademarking the term “dirty soda” and selling not just the beverage but also savory snacks like pretzel bites and sweet treats like frozen hot chocolate and sugar cookies. In 2024, as the Mormon Wives swigged on their Swigs onscreen, the chain’s systemwide sales grew nearly 50% to $84 million, and dirty soda’s presence on restaurant menus increased 42%. The rising popularity of the confectionery concoction is evident even in national fast food chains, which have raced to make their menus dirty-soda-friendly. Applebee’s offers dirty fountain sodas, while Sonic recently announced unlimited free customizations to their Coke beverages, tapping artists Benny Blanco, Jessie Murph and MGK to share their favorite “signature Coke combinations.” (Blanco, for his part, adds pickles to his Cherry Coke. Questionable!)

In addition to big-name soda chains like Swig and Cool Sips, which boasts multiple locations in New York City, mom-and-pop dirty-soda shops have also popped up across the U.S.

Kati Pederson opened Cleveland’s first dirty-soda shop, Rockin’ Refreshments, in 2023. In addition to running her shop, she’s also the epicenter of the dirty soda TikTok community, where she offers business advice and mentorship guides for those looking to open their own dirty-soda shops. So far, she said, she’s mentored over 100 people who have gone on to open their own dirty-soda businesses.

“The coolest thing about it is it's something so simple, and it's something inexpensive that can be made,” she says. “And the best part about it is that if someone owns a food truck and they're selling cheeseburgers or something that's perishable, they can lose a lot of money if their event gets canceled or the weather's bad. But with dirty sodas, you have syrups that last a long time — I mean, over a year — and if your event gets canceled, you're not losing much money. So the overhead for this business is not huge.”

And people are catching on. “Every farmer's market that you go to nowadays, or any big event, most likely has a dirty soda vendor,” says Pederson. “It’s kind of changed the industry in the way that even coffee trailers are offering these dirty sodas or a variation of a refresher that really has dirty-soda roots. So it's kind of infiltrated into every business in the United States.”

Pederson says dirty sodas are a fun option for kids and teens at events like high school sports games or dances, as well as for those engaged in the rising “sober-curious” movement. Mills, the food blogger, agrees.

“I do see a rise in mocktails, or people just choosing to not drink alcohol for whatever reason,” she says. “So I think with that becoming more mainstream as well, dirty sodas are just another fun option for people to have besides a mocktail. It’s an easy drink that still feels a little special.”

Of course, if you do drink alcohol and want to indulge in the dirty-soda trend, there’s no reason you can’t add a little vodka to your Dr Pepper with coconut cream. Recipes for extra dirty sodas abound online, though they do defeat the original purpose of creating a nonalcoholic beverage to enjoy. But dirty soda is no longer just for the Mormons — now it’s for the masses.