Cocktail umbrella

A small plastic retaining ring is often fashioned against the stem, a toothpick, in order to prevent the umbrella from folding up spontaneously.

A sleeve of folded newspaper is located under the collar or base of the cocktail umbrella and is made out of recycled paper from either China, India or Japan.

According to cocktail historian Dale DeGroff, Beach started the trend in 1932 after spending much of his time collecting things from the world, most notably from the South Pacific.

Beach sold his merchandise, including the cocktail umbrellas, to Victor Bergeron, owner of the Emeryville, California-based bar chain Trader Vic's.

According to Bergeron's son Joe, Trader Vic's used the paper parasols until their production was halted by World War II.

[2] According to Hawaiian-themed author Rick Carroll, Hawaiian bartender Harry K. Yee of the Hilton Waikiki was the first to use a paper parasol in a beverage in 1959 during the Tiki culture craze of the 1950s.

[citation needed] Another theory exists that Beach met Yee while vacationing in Hawaii after World War II.

According to an Eater article published in 2015, many people, during the difficult times faced during the Great Depression, saw the South Pacific as "a place of exotic abandon, where you didn't have to work for a living."

[5] Another hypothesis about the cocktail umbrella's purpose is that its absence can lead to faster evaporation of alcohol due to direct sunlight when the drink is served outdoors.

Unlike foods commonly used as garnishes, such as cherries, olives, or citrus, cocktail umbrellas do not add to the flavor of the drink and have a purely aesthetic purpose.

People have also found ways to turn cocktail umbrellas into art, as is the case with Dutch trio We Make Carpets.