Orange juice feels the squeeze

By Judith Weinraub
Washington Post

What drink is full of potassium, folic acid, vitamin C and a slew of antioxidants?

What longtime American favorite has slipped enough in sales that its industry is now mounting a major advertising campaign?

The answer to all these questions is orange juice.

Shunned by the low-carb diets for its concentrated carbohydrates and pummeled by a drop in sales, orange juice is having to polish up its image for the American public. Instead of being hailed for its many health benefits, orange juice has become an easy carbohydrate to forgo. And the orange juice industry is worried.

Orange juice consumption is at a record low, according to Florida Citrus Mutual, an association of 11,000 citrus growers. In the past two years, orange juice consumption has dropped about 5 percent. Last year, Americans drank about 4.7 gallons of orange juice. In 1997, the figure was 5.8 gallons. Since 1999, overall orange juice consumption is down 10.8 percent.

In the past year — the time that corresponds to the growing popularity of the South Beach Diet — that drop has been particularly noticeable. In the 52 weeks preceding April 18 alone, chilled orange juice sales fell 4.1 percent by volume, according to Information Resources Inc., a Chicago-based market research firm.

"The low-carb diet is the single biggest factor in the decrease in orange juice sales," says Dan Gunter, executive director for the Florida Department of Citrus.

In December 2003, the Florida citrus agency asked the A.C. Nielsen Co. to investigate the sales drop and look at the connection between low-carb attitudes and orange juice. The findings: Over the past year, of the 2,600 households randomly surveyed, 26 percent of people knowingly reduced their orange juice consumption. And of that 26 percent, 35 percent did so because of low-carb dieting.

Getting specific numbers from the major orange juice players is a challenge. "We don't have a complete picture, says Charles Torrey, Minute Maid's marketing director for refrigerated products. "From what we can survey, about 10 percent of consumers are drinking less orange juice, stating calories, sugar or carbohydrates as the reason. We also can surmise through secondary data, such as articles in nutrition journals and newspapers, (that) about 4 percent of consumers may be avoiding orange juice specifically because of the low-carb diet."

At Tropicana, chief marketing officer Ron Coughlin admits the orange juice category has seen a decline but says orange juice sales at Tropicana are steady.

Promoting OJ

•	"When you look at foods through a low-carb lens, you miss the big picture. ... It makes little sense to reject wholesome, nutrient-dense foods such as orange juice." Ed Blonz • Author and nutrition expert

"Rarely has a food habit been adopted so quickly by so many people," says Andy Smith, editor of the forthcoming Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America (Oxford University Press). "Americans became convinced during this time that (their) health depended on orange juice each morning."

At first that juice was fresh. "The vast abundance and the lowering of cost of oranges during the early 20th century made fresh-squeezed orange juice common at breakfast," says Smith. Then during the 1920s and '30s, the focus shifted to canned juice.

But the newly refined freezing process and advances in transportation developed during World War II propelled orange juice into refrigerated trucks, supermarkets and kitchens after the war. Industry giants Tropicana and Minute Maid point to their roles in that process.

Minute Maid gets the credit for frozen concentrate. Before the end of the war, Minute Maid's eventual founder Jack Fox was working on powdered juice for the Army.

With the end of the war, he came upon freezing, an interim process that had more promise. In 1949, his company, the Florida Foods Corp., changed its name to Minute Maid.

Tropicana gets the credit for flash-pasteurizing fresh orange juice (by raising the temperature of the juice for a very short time) in 1954 and shipping it in wax cartons.

The industry has always had its challenges: freezing weather that cut into crops; diseases that attack citrus groves, competition from other juice drinks on supermarket shelves, and from an on-the-go lifestyle.

Then came the sales drop of the past three years. "No one was quite sure why," says Gunter. "We started looking for the other things and only recently discovered what it really was — the low-carb diet and an increased awareness even among people not on the diet that orange juice has carbs in it."

A typical eight-ounce glass of orange juice has 26 to 27 grams of carbohydrates. That's far more than an eight-ounce glass of tomato juice at 10 grams, whole milk at 11 grams or skim milk at 12 grams, according to "The Nutrition Bible" by Jean Anderson and Barbara Deskins (Dimensions, 1997).

The Florida Department of Citrus decided to address the problem by emphasizing the health values of orange juice.

"We'd gotten away from plugging vitamin C and potassium and folic acid," says the department's spokesman Andrew Meadows. "And lately there's been a lot of buzz around antioxidants, and orange juice is loaded with them. The underlying message is that if you're on a diet or not, orange juice is such a valuable source of vitamins and minerals that you don't need to cut it out."

Last month, the citrus department turned to television as part of a $1.8 million campaign to revitalize orange juice sales. Its catchy ad features an upbeat guy throwing things into a blender to make an ideal but very unattractive health drink: rutabagas for vitamin C, liver for thiamin, Brussels sprouts for vitamin B6, a little fish for magnesium. Or, he says, you could just drink a glass of Florida orange juice.

The point, after all, is sales. And, according to Florida Citrus Mutual, this year's drop in sales is happening when there is a record orange crop on the Florida trees and a record high amount of already-squeezed juice in storage.

Industry responds

Now, the industry is developing and pushing products that appeal to the low-carb crowd. Last month, Minute Maid, which is owned by Coca-Cola, brought out Minute Maid Premium Light, with half the carbs, calories and sugar of regular orange juice. This week, Tropicana, which is owned by PepsiCo, will bring out a revised version of its new Tropicana Lite'n Healthy, with half the carbs, calories and sugar of regular juice.

The industry is naturally hoping that the low-carb way of life is a trend rather than a revolution. "We think it will run its course," says Minute Maid's Torrey. "I believe people will go back to what makes sense — a balanced diet governed by reason and discipline."

Many other people who don't make their living selling orange juice are urging consumers to adopt a balanced attitude as well.

"When you look at foods through a low-carb lens, you miss the big picture," says Ed Blonz, an author and nutrition expert. "If you want to lower the risk of chronic diseases — obesity, diabetes or coronary heart disease — it makes little sense to reject wholesome, nutrient-dense foods such as orange juice in favor of a low-carb, fast-food entrée or some carb-free processed food. Orange juice has vitamin C, folic acid, potassium and untold naturally occurring beneficial compounds. All this make it a great food."