In August 2021, 61% of Tropicana was sold along with the rest of PepsiCo's juice brand portfolio for $3.3 billion to PAI Partners.

Tropicana traces his roots to Anthony T. Rossi, a native of Sicily, Italy, who immigrated to the United States in 1921 when he was 21.

[4] Rossi began producing frozen concentrated orange juice at the East Bradenton location as a natural extension of the fruit section business.

[6] He developed flash pasteurization in 1954, a preservation process that raised the temperature of juice for a short time to only minimally affect its taste.

[7] The company developed a trademarked cartoon mascot for the brand called Tropic-Ana, a barefoot young girl carrying oranges on her head and wearing clothing that resembles a Hawaiian grass skirt and lei.

[10] Ed Price was hired as executive vice president and director in 1955 and represented the company as chairman of the Florida Citrus Commission.

[3] Tropicana purchased one million dollars worth of refrigerated trucks to deliver Pure Premium in the mid to late fifties.

[5] By 1958, a ship, S.S. Tropicana, delivered 1.5 million US gallons (1,200,000 imp gal; 5,700 m3) of juice to New York each week from the new base at Cape Canaveral, Florida.

[3] In 1970, Tropicana orange juice was shipped as finished goods via refrigerated boxcars in one weekly round-trip from Florida to Kearny, New Jersey.

By the following year, the company was operating two 65-car unit trains a week, each carrying around 1 million US gallons (830,000 imp gal; 3,800 m3) of juice.

An additional 100 cars were soon incorporated into the fleet, and small mechanical refrigeration units were installed to keep temperatures constant on hot days.

[3] Executive vice president Ed Price, who served two terms in the Florida Senate (1958–1966), resigned his position in 1972, but remained on the board of directors until 1983.

By that time, the company was also distributing Tropicana Pure Premium in Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, Argentina, Panama, and Sweden.

As the 1990s continued, Tropicana further expanded internationally, entering several more Latin American countries, Hong Kong and China.

[16] Citing an increased consumer interest in the origin of food products, the company announced in February 2012 that its Tropicana Pure Premium line would return to sourcing oranges only from Florida.

[18] In February 2009, Tropicana switched the design on all cartons sold in the United States to a new image created by the Arnell Group.

After two months of negative consumer reaction and a 20% drop in sales, Tropicana switched back to its original design of an orange skewered by a drinking straw.

[29] Trop50, introduced by Tropicana in 2009, is orange juice with 50% less sugar and calories, a reduction achieved by dilution with 50% water and the addition of Reb A or PureVia, chemically altered versions of the Stevia plant.