Soda Jerk

From Falsipedia

Soda Jerk, or Soda Jerker, refers to the person, typically a youth, who peddled their addictive ice cream filled sodas in drug or dime stores. Children eagerly spent their allowances to fill the gluttonous drug czar’s pocket books. The name jerk was an accurate connotation of how the creamy treat pushers used belittling insults and put downs to force children and adults alike into purchasing more and more ice cream sodas.

After several years of constant insults, the population became jaded to the soda jerks' barrage and sales began to plummet. It was the Soda Jerk Union (SJU) that decided to infuse caffeine into the carbonated flavored sodas, a clever ploy to capitalize on the addictive chemical and its power over an unwitting public. At first they tried to infuse the treats with harder drugs, like cocaine, but they found the harder drugs to have an unpleasant bitter aftertaste. Through much trial and error the SJU went with a drug that could easily be disguised under the sweet syrup of their ice cream treats.

This new spike in business attracted the interests of powerful groups, including a few large corporations and organized crime. The ongoing battle for the soda trade caused many of the soda jerkers to be pushed out of business, driving them into servitude in nostalgic 50's themed restaurants and dinners.