When Is It Not Real?

Hi Everyone,

We have just experienced one of the hottest summers since records have been kept. I can remember when we used to get about, maybe 10 days of 90 degrees or hotter. Now, I lost count after June ended. But, when it gets really hot, one of the best and most refreshing, non-alcoholic summer drink is lemonade. I personally like it on the tart side. Of course there are tons of other drinks, including soda, but today's blog is about lemonade and in particular, Tropicana lemonade.

So what are the ingredients for making perfect lemonade? Growing up, the only ingredients used were lemons, water and sugar. The grand total is three! Makes perfect sense to me. What else could possibly be needed? These days since we don't make our own lemonade, we buy it instead. Do you read the labels on every food and drink product that you buy? We read some, but not all. Now I think that is a mistake. After recently buying Tropicana lemonade, I just happened to read the ingredients label. Instead of three ingredients, there are at least six. I say at least six, because when I tell you the ingredients you will understand. Tropicana's ingredients are: filtered water, high fructose corn syrup, sucrose, lemon juice concentrate, ascorbic acid (vitamin C) and natural flavors. Natural flavors? Since flavors is plural, how many flavor ingredients have been added? Hence my reason for saying it has at least six ingredients. But come on now, in reality, if you already use lemon juice concentrate, what other natural flavors are necessary? Isn't lemon juice concentrate already full of vitamin C? My point here is that the original three ingredients have blossomed into at least six now. Why?

Common sense tells me that if Tropicana used less ingredients, the following would happen: 1) their costs would decrease and 2) the product would be better for their consumers. Call me crazy, but isn't that called a win-win situation? So what is the down side and why don't they make their lemonade with only three ingredients? Oh yea, it's called shelf life! By adding those "extra" ingredients, Tropicana has increased the shelf life to an amazing seven+ weeks. Which means it is more like two months+. Most likely though, by using real products, the shelf life would decrease. I would bet dollars to donuts (what does that actually mean?) that people would rather have the real ingredients with no other additives. Doesn't that just make common sense? Someone should inform Tropicana ASAP! So the question is, if Tropicana can make OJ with only oranges, how come they can't do the same for lemonade?

Til next week.

Peter