Why do soft drinks use bubbly soda? It is the only way to make that much sugar palatable. Sugar ends up being more toxic and addictive than the little cocaine once used.
Former exec regrets Coke's marketing campaign
Text: Nola.com/Newsflash, The Washington Post News Service, with Bloomberg News
WASHINGTON - Todd Putman stepped up to a podium Thursday ready to break with his past.
Spread before him was a ballroom full of public health officials and
community activists, gathered for a "National Soda Summit" on how to
loosen the soda industry's grip on the American appetite.
The conference marked the latest salvo in a barrage of recent attacks
on makers of unhealthy food and beverages, especially soda.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, I, announced plans to ban
super-size sodas from his city's restaurants, movie theaters, sports
arenas, and bodegas. Disney will no longer run junk-food ads with its
children's programming. First lady Michelle's book about the White
House vegetable garden, released Tuesday, notes that the only drinks
offered during family meals at home are milk and water.
The logic behind these moves has been repeated so often it is
practically a mantra: The nation is in the throes of an obesity crisis,
and sodas account for an outsize share of the sugar pouring into
American bellies.
Putman, 51, shares that view. But he is also driven by another
motive: From 1997 to mid-2000, he was a top marketing executive at
Coca-Cola.
"It took me 10 years to figure out that I have a large karmic debt to
pay for the number of Cokes I sold across this country," he said. On Thursday, he came to settle it.
He wanted to give an inside account of what he contends has been a
drive by Coca-Cola to replace not just its direct competitors but all
beverages in the American diet -- a campaign for what the company called
"share of stomach." He wanted to warn about the industry's focus on
young people and minorities.
But mostly he wanted to level the playing field.
"I'm not against soft drinks per se," he began carefully. "What I am
for is balance of power. And I think the power has shifted in the wrong
direction. The resources, the scale, the intelligence, the strategy
these companies use is intense.
"We need to take all that thinking...all that strategy and convert it -- jujitsu it -- to healthy products."
Such a mission would have been inconceivable to the man who joined
Coca-Cola back in 1997, Putman said during an interview before the
speech.
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