Toby Howell

Water is boring.

Too early for a beer.

Perhaps a refresher is the beverage that you're looking for.

And it's the rise of the refresher category that I want to talk about on today's edition of Toby's Trends.

A quick refresher on what a refresher is.

It's sort of whatever you want it to be.

There are two essential components, according to Alyssa Bute-Kofer, who leads marketing at McDonald's.

One, they are cold.

And two, they come in vibrant colors.

They are very Instagrammable.

The base of a refresher can be anything from a lemonade to a green tea.

Sometimes they have carbonation in them.

Other times there's caffeine involved.

It's almost easier to say what a refresher is not, says Claire Conahan, a trendologist at Data Central.

It is not a coffee or a tea.

But restaurants are suddenly very interested in this not easy to define drink.

McDonald's is diving into the crowded category this May with the launch of unnaturally bright fruit-flavored drinks following a successful pilot program across 500 stores.

Taco Bell, Dunkin' and Sonic have all been in the refresher game for a while now.

Starbucks credits itself with inventing the category all the way back in 2012, and it's since become a $2 billion a year business for them.

Neil, can't say I've ordered a refresher before, but clearly lots of other people have.