Profile America
June 17, 2008



Soft Drinks

In the past, hot summer days meant that some enterprising youngsters in the neighborhood would set up a lemonade stand at five cents a glass, or the family would share a pitcher of iced tea on the front porch to cool off. Today, the drink of choice is a soft drink, usually carbonated. And while the summer heat does call for more to drink, Americans have a powerful thirst all year long. As a result, we each drink about 52 gallons of soft drinks annually — up 18 gallons from 1980. The increasing popularity of bottled water has lead to an even greater increase. In 1980, we each drank about 2½ gallons of bottled water. Now that figure is over 25 gallons a year. You can find these and more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau online at <www.census.gov>.