Orange Julius® Goes Totally Bananas With New Premium Fruit Smoothie

Banana Chill is new low-fat addition to the menu

MINNEAPOLIS (May 31, 2006) –Orange Julius of America, the first retail outlet to specialize in fruit-flavored beverages with its original, famous and frothy Julius® Original blended fruit drinks, today announced the addition of the new, low-fat Banana Chill Premium Fruit Smoothie.

Banana Chill is a delicious blend of bananas and non-fat frozen yogurt. All Orange Julius Premium Fruit Smoothies are made with real fruit and are available in several flavors ranging from tangy to sweet. Banana Chill joins other popular Orange Julius smoothie flavors including consumer favorites Strawberry Sensation® (made with strawberries, tropical fruit juice and non-fat frozen yogurt) and Strawberry Xtreme® (made with strawberries, bananas, tropical fruit juice and non-fat frozen yogurt).

Bananas are the world’s most popular fruit and the fourth largest fruit crop in the world. World production is estimated to be 28 million tons.

"The popularity of bananas and success of our recent ‘add-a-banana’ promotion led us to introduce a drink exclusively featuring bananas," said Ann Stone, vice president of Mall Concepts. "Our heritage is about Orange and Strawberry Julius and while we have other Premium Fruit Smoothie flavors, it was the next logical step to go with banana."

Orange Julius and Dairy Queen® Orange Julius locations serve an assortment of Orange Julius Original drinks in addition to Premium Fruit Smoothies. A variety of soft-serve specialties are also on the menu at Dairy Queen® Orange Julius stores, including the signature Dairy Queen Blizzard® Flavor Treats and MooLatté® frozen blended coffee beverages.

About Orange Julius
First established in 1926 as an orange juice stand in Los Angeles, Orange Julius® today has more than 130 Orange Julius stores and more than 265 combination Dairy Queen/Orange Julius locations in the U.S., plus additional locations in Canada and International markets.  The Orange Julius of America franchise is a wholly-owned subsidiary of International Dairy Queen (IDQ).  IDQ is one of the world’s largest distributors of frozen treats, hot food items and other drinks and treats with a system of more than 5,700 Dairy Queen stores in the United States, Canada and other foreign countries.  For more information about Orange Julius, please visit www.orangejulius.com or www.idq.com.

Editor’s Note:  Full color images of Banana Chill as well as of other Julius® Premium Fruit Smoothies, are available upon request.

Contacts
Dean Peters
Director of Communications
International Dairy Queen, Inc.
7505 Metro Blvd.
Minneapolis, MN 55439
Phone: +1 (952) 830-0204