The Industry Situation of the 70's

During the late 1960's, soft drinks were well on their way to becoming America's #1 beverage choice. Carbonated drinks had been trailing at #2 since 1967 behind coffee, but were quickly growing as a favorable beverage choice. Milk was the #3 drink of choice while beer, tea, juices, and distilled spirits followed.

There was a dip in soft drink sales for a few years after the ban of cyclamate in 1969. Cyclamate was the common sweetening agent used in soft drinks. Because of the ban on cyclamate, Pepsi-Cola launched Pepsi-Light using saccharin as their sweetener but quickly fizzled out as high fructose corn syrup was introduced in 1974. The introduction of high fructose corn syrup came at a time when sugar prices were incredibly high, making HFCS the best alternative as a sweetener.

Like many industries during the 1970's, the soft drink industry was also hurt by the economic depression. Private label soft drinks made a small peak of sales in 1972 but slowly drifted downward after that. Larger national brands used value-packaging in returnable containers as well as other packaging innovations to help boost sales.