Tuesday, November 11: Perhaps you’ve noticed that Coke and Pepsi are going at each other’s throats, not over who makes the best-tasting cola drinks but who sells the best water. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that the Cola Wars have spilled over to the Flavored Water Wars.
Perhaps you’ve seen the TV advertisements for Propel Fit Water, a vitamin-infused water made by Pepsi-owned Gatorade, slamming a product that reminds you of Glaceau VitaminWater, which is made by Coke. What are the sins of VitaminWater, at least according to Pepsi? That would be Glaceau VitaminWater’s 125 calories per bottle, compared to Propel’s 25 calories.
Like me, you may be wondering: How did “water” get so many calories? After all, the textbook definition of water is a calorie-free, odorless and colorless fluid replacement that doesn’t contain sugar. So what are these soft drink companies doing?
The easy answer: they’re pouring sweet additives into their water to make their beverage taste better—or sweeter. If you look at the ingredients labels of these “fitness” waters, you’ll find water listed first, followed by high fructose corn syrup or glucose or sucrose or sucrose syrup or even artificial sweeteners like sucralose (aka Splenda) and acesfulfame potassium (aka Sunett).
Oh, sure, the manufactures will say they’ve added vitamins like calcium, electrolytes, amino acids, and herbs to their waters, but the only reason these fitness waters are pleasing to modern tastes is because there’s a tinge of sweetness to each sip. We’re being sold a pig in a poke here.
There’s another aspect to this that must be addressed, and it’s how these companies can say that they are selling you “water” with a straight face. You would think that a company that flavors basic H2O with high fructose corn syrup flavors—lemon, orange, and berry—and adds vitamins and antioxidants wouldn’t still be able to call their beverage “water,” but not in the Alice in Wonderland world we live in. The International Bottled Water Association (yes, such an organization exists) decided that if the additives don’t add up to more than 1 percent by weight of the final product, then it could be sold as water.
So there you have it: a product with four grams of sugar in each bottle is on the same shelf next to the bottled water. When it comes to something as basic as drinking water, you should accept no imitations. I hate to see this wonderfully health resource perverted, so to speak, to satisfy our taste buds.