As the drink did not contain much iron, nor was it brewed, the passage of this legislation led the company to change the product's name to the presently used Irn-Bru.

[8] As of 1999, it contained 0.002% of ammonium ferric citrate, sugar, 32 flavouring agents including caffeine and quinine (but not in Australia), and two controversial colourings (Sunset Yellow FCF E110 and Ponceau 4R E124).

On 27 January 2010, soft-drink manufacturer A.G. Barr agreed to a Food Standards Agency voluntary ban on these two colourings although no date was set for their replacement.

[9] After lobbying by First Minister of Scotland Alex Salmond, a proposed restriction of Sunset Yellow to 10 mg/litre was eased to 20 mg/litre in 2011 – the same amount present in Irn-Bru.

A similar beverage was launched in 1898 by London essence firm Stevenson & Howell that supplied soft drinks manufacturers in the UK and colonies.

[12] An advertisement for Barr's Iron Brew dated 1900 featuring the original strongman label can be found in Falkirk's Local History Archives.

[14] Barr's trademark application for the brand name Irn-Bru dates from July 1946[15] when the drink was still off sale because of wartime regulations.

Irn-Bru has long been the most popular soft drink in Scotland, with Coca-Cola second, but competition between the two brands brought their sales to roughly equal levels by 2003.

[19] It is also the third best selling soft drink in the UK,[20] after Coca-Cola and Pepsi, outselling high-profile brands such as Fanta, Dr Pepper, Sprite and 7 Up.

[24][25] Irn-Bru was also sold in reusable 750 ml glass bottles[26] which, like other Barr's drinks, were able to be returned to the manufacturer in exchange for a 30 pence (previously 20p) deposit paid on purchase.

[27][28] As a result of a 40% drop in returned bottles since the 1990s Barr deemed the washing and re-filling process uneconomical,[29] and on 1 January 2016 ceased the scheme.

[27][28] 2016 saw the introduction of the current logo, conveying "strength" and an "industrial feel",[30] and a new diet variant called Irn-Bru Xtra[31][32] in different branding to the existing sugar free variety in a similar fashion to Coca-Cola Zero and Pepsi Max.

Barr changed the formula of Irn-Bru in January 2018 in response to a sugar tax implemented in the UK in April 2018, intended to combat obesity.

[39] Irn-Bru was the only soft drink on sale at the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland, due to a sponsorship arrangement.

[40] The volume of editorial and opinion publicity the drink gained on social and print media was described as "the summit's surprise", coverage worth millions.

[43] Barr's actively promoted their Irn-Bru from the outset, with some of their earliest ads featuring world champion wrestlers and Highland Games athletes Donald Dinnie and Alex Munro who endorsed the drink by means of personal testimonials.

[44] In the 1930s, the firm began a long-running series of comic strip ads entitled "The Adventures of Ba-Bru" which ran in various local papers from April 1939 until October 1970.

[48] David Amers, Planning Director, said: "Irn-Bru is the likeable maverick of the soft drinks market and these ads perfectly capture the brand's spirit."

One involved a grandfather (played by actor Robert Wilson) who removed his false teeth to spoil his grandson's interest in his can of Irn-Bru.

A further TV advertisement featured a senior citizen in a motorised wheelchair robbing a local shopping market of a supply of Irn-Bru.

This campaign consisted of a parody commercial of a popular Christmas Cartoon, The Snowman, and was effective in interesting American audiences in the Irn-Bru brand.

[55][56] A 2009 advertisement for the product featured a group of high school pupils performing a musical number, with the refrain "It's fizzy, it's ginger, it's phenomenal!"

[62] However, the scene involving the mother shaving at the end of the advertisement was deemed by Ofcom to be "capable of causing offence by strongly reinforcing negative stereotypes", and so it was taken off the air.

[62] In 2003, an Irn-Bru commercial which showed a midwife trying to entice a baby from its mother's womb during a difficult delivery sparked fifty complaints.

It is now imported direct from the UK and distributed by British Provender,[70] and can again be found in the international sections of major supermarket chains and some convenience stores.

[80] Other European territories where Irn Bru is sold include Spain, the Netherlands, Germany, Gibraltar, Belgium, Poland, Malta, Greece and Cyprus.

After its original bottler went out of business, a new deal was signed for the drink to be manufactured and distributed in larger quantities by the Pepsi Bottling Group of Russia in 2002.