Coke’s New Cola: Fewer Calories, but Not Zero Calories Last year...

Coke’s New Cola: Fewer Calories, but Not Zero Calories

Last year Coca Cola KO -0.51% Co. said it would test out a new version of its flagship cola sweetened with stevia, a trendy new plant-based zero-calorie sweetener. Now, the test–which originally involved the Argentinian market– is expanding to a bigger and more visible market: Britain. The new Coca Cola Life brand is a version of Coke flavored partly with sugar and partly with stevia, resulting in a reduced-calorie drink, not a zero-calorie one. Coca Cola’s experimentation with stevia comes despite Pepsi CEO Indra Nooyi, a prominent advocate of experimenting with reduced calorie products, saying last year that stevia’s taste does not work well in cola drinks. But Coke seems to think it has cracked the code, saying stevia-sweetened Coca Cola Life will become the first new Coca Cola version launched in Britain since Coke Zero in 2006. Until now, stevia has been used by the company to sweeten some of its Sprite and vitaminwater brands. The new brand will have 36% less calories than a full-sugar cola, the company says. So what is stevia? As the WSJ reported last year: Stevia sweetener is derived from a shrub native to parts of South America and is cultivated mainly in Paraguay and China. The stevia plant leaves contain steviol glycosides which are the sweet-tasting compounds. The most famous compound type is called rebaudioside A or reb “A”. “The [U.S. Food and Drug Association] approval of stevia in food and drink opened the door for this market’s explosion,” said David Browne, senior analyst at research firm Mintel. The World Health Organization in 2006 also declared that stevia as a natural sweetener is safe.


The announcement of a lower-calorie drink comes a couple of months after a top U.K. government official sent a warning shot to makers of sugary food and drinks: Sally Davies, the chief medical Officer for England, said in her annual report on the health of the nation that action is required to tackle an alarming prevalence of overweight and obesity in England which is being seen as the norm…. “I call on manufacturers to ramp up reformulation of products to use less added sugar. If voluntary efforts fail to deliver then we, as a society, may need to consider the public health benefits that could be derived from regulation such as a ‘sugar tax’,” she said in her report, adding that clear labeling of added sugar content would also help. The Department of Health said the government was making progress in getting the food and drink industry to cut the amount of calories, including sugar, in their foods through voluntary initiatives, and child obesity rates fell last year to the lowest level since 1998. “Our voluntary approach is delivering results but we want to see more progress and have always been clear that if food and drink companies fail to act we will look at other options, and are keeping the international evidence under review,” a spokesperson said in a statement. In announcing its new drink, Coke was keen to remind us that it is playing ball with the U.K. government’s Public Health Responsibility Deal, a part of the voluntary approach mentioned by Ms. Davies: Coca Cola Great Britain is a public signatory to the Government’s Responsibility Deal and has committed to reduce the average calories per litre in its range of sparkling drinks by 5% by the end of 2014. More than 40% of the cola sold by CCGB in the UK is already no-calorie and the launch of Coca‑Cola Life gives consumers even greater choice within the portfolio: Coca‑Cola, Coca‑Cola Life with a third fewer calories1 and two zero-calorie options in Coca‑Cola Zero and Diet Coke.