Liquid Arizona: Temple University

Two ASU grads put themselves through cocktail school to create America’s first canned Shirley Temple.

by Craig Outhier | photos by Angelina Aragon

The Shirley Temple plays an important role in cocktaildom: training wheels. Traditionally made with an ounce of grenadine over ice, then topped with lemon-lime soda or ginger ale and finished with a maraschino cherry, it’s the cocktail you make for someone who doesn’t drink alcohol. Like a child, perhaps, or your uncle in recovery. That’s how 20-something college pals Sydney Attis and Mikalya Garcia remembered the drink. Their innovation: Take off the training wheels. “The idea came to us [in 2023] during one of our daily FaceTime catchups,” recalls Attis, who was living in New York City at the time and remotely running a social medial marketing agency with her Arizona State University sorority sister. “While reminiscing about our college days, we thought of our shared love for Shirley Temple cocktails and how we could make consuming them more convenient and accessible by creating our own canned version.” And the young entrepreneurs were off to the races.

Like true Zillennials, the duo first turned to social media for inspiration, collecting “hundreds of comments about different ways people enjoy their Shirley Temples.” Over six months, they outlined a model beverage: fruity and natural tasting, done in vodka, tequila and virgin styles. The name: Just Call Me Shirley, was vaguely inspired by the famous Airplane! pun.

The partners contacted a St. Louis-based flavoring company and hashed out a formula with “natural cherry and lemon-lime flavors that recreated the iconic taste.” Sans grenadine, the inviting pink color would come from “fruit and vegetable concentrates, such as carrot and blackcurrant.” The sweetness, from cane sugar.

Designing their packaging over FaceTime with a pair of friends in graphic design, Attis and Garcia found wholesale sources for vodka and tequila, and contracted with a canning facility in Pennsylvania. Their first cans rolled off the line in late 2024.

The duo scored a coup in April 2025, when Just Call Me Shirley won the 2025 UPS Store Small Biz Challenge, netting them a $25,000 prize and exposure that’s carrying the product into Arizona stores this summer. And if you unwittingly get stuck with one of the virgin Shirleys, that can be rectified. “Pair it with prosecco for a Shirley Spritz!” Attis suggests.

Beer of the Month

Pinnacle Maximum Heffort

Wheat Beer/5% ABV/13 IBU

We could be here all day arguing about the world’s superior hot-weather beer. The pilsner camp will cling to its crispness and clean finish. The blonde ale people will drone on about lushness and ABV bite. And over here? We’ll go to the mat for hefeweizen, for its fruitiness, spice and raw gulpability. Certainly, this summer-appropriate offering from Scottsdale’s Pinnacle checks all the boxes, but when they tell you it’s “light and bright with a hint of banana and clove,” know they’re not kidding with the “hint” part. Both are bewitchingly subtle, making this hefe maximally appealing for volume summer refreshment. pinnaclebrewing.com