Why Coca-Cola wants to sell the world expensive “science milk”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/02/04/why-coca-cola-wants-to-sell-the-world-expensive-science-milk/

by petethomas • 11 years ago

28 51 11 years ago

washingtonpost.com

rickdale• 11 years ago

It's interesting that milk consumption is down so much and the fact that whole milk is down even more make me attribute it all to the backwardness of the food pyramid that people form their diet around. I don't know though. I don't follow the pyramid, but also stay away from milk because I don't like the taste too much and I don't trust the process of how it got to me. Just grosses me out for irrational reasons. Either way, zero chance I'll ever consume a 'Fairlife'.

Guthur• 11 years ago

I was certainly with you on the taste factor for quite sometime with milk. Then I manage to get some non-homogenized Jersey cow milk and realised milk does not have to taste terrible. The fact is the vast majority of milk these days is from cows selected for quantity over quality, and homogenization removes so much character from the taste.

Edit. Also full cream or why bother.

c0ur7n3y• 11 years ago

Placebo Water™ - Imagine the difference!™

Zikes• 11 years ago

50% more protein, 30% less sugar, and lactose free. Any one of those on their own would be a differentiator from conventional milk that consumers would potentially look for.

narag• 11 years ago

If it's free from lactose, then has it 30% less sugar than what?

Eric_WVGG• 11 years ago

taste test: http://www.theverge.com/tldr/2015/2/3/7971373/fairlife-coca-...

verdict, tastes like milk, bit of malty aftertaste, typically offensive marketing

gregcrv• 11 years ago

Doesn't tastes like milk: it tastes like something labeled "milk" in supermarkets. Not that many people anymore know the taste of a real fresh milk that just came out of an animal.

edit: if you never did, go on a farm and try, you'll see, it's very different

coldtea• 11 years ago

Why Coca-Cola wants to sell the world expensive “science milk”

For profit? Companies would sell heroin to kids if they could get away with it.

skjfhskjhf• 11 years ago

Humans are the only animals that drink milk after infancy. We are also the only animals that are influenced by advertising.

Got Milk? Does a body good. And other bullshit to help you decided.

taeric• 11 years ago

Not that I am completely against your point, but I think you need a little better reasoning. Humans are the only animals that do a lot of things after infancy.

crazygringo• 11 years ago

We're also the only animals that cook meat, or eat chocolate, or who get to eat fresh strawberries in the winter.

I always find it odd when people consider drinking milk to be unnatural, somehow -- as though it's any more unnatural than the other 99% of our modern diet.

dragonwriter2• 11 years ago

We're also the only animals that [...] get to eat fresh strawberries in the winter.

My cat would disagree with that.

I always find it odd when people consider drinking milk to be unnatural, somehow -- as though it's any more unnatural than the other 99% of our modern diet.

Well, the fact that most non-Northern European adults are lactose intolerant is a better basis for concluding that drinking milk is, for most people, "unnatural" than is available for most other foodstuffs.

sosborn• 11 years ago

We are also the only animals that are influenced by advertising.

If that's true then what the hell are peacocks doing?

oska• 11 years ago

I'd suggest that it was not advertising but a harsh environment and natural selection that led humans in Northern Europe to develop lactase persistence so they could drink milk after infancy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactase_persistence

ironchef2• 11 years ago

Do you know why we drink milk after infancy? Because we evolved to. It was when man domesticated the Auroch (the predecessor to the cow) that it is thought they started holding on to lactase production farther into life. Milk allowed the humans to live better and fatter when times were lean. As such, there was an evolution towards continue lactase production. There's some really interesting work in this area done by McCracken out of UCLA. There's also some cool studies since then around the cultural migrations of lactase and lactose intolerance by Enattah and Tishkoff.

Pretty neat stuff seeing how evolution affects all of us.

dragonwriter2• 11 years ago

Do you know why we drink milk after infancy? Because we evolved to.

"We" in this case being, essentially, Northern Europeans. Lactase persistence isn't really the global norm.

brandonmenc• 11 years ago

Evolving to digest dairy is probably what saved the people who migrated into the colder climates of Northern Europe.

For those of us with the ability digest it, a moderate amount of dairy is probably a good thing.

http://www.nature.com/news/archaeology-the-milk-revolution-1...

serve_yay2• 11 years ago

Well, good luck to them. There really isn't a good reason to drink straight milk in my opinion, though it makes sauces and soups nicer.

roywiggins• 11 years ago

People buy expensive coffee, expensive protein drinks, and expensive smoothies- why not milk? Doesn't surprise me at all.

michaelbuddy• 11 years ago

as long as it's 140 calories of mostly sugar in a can, you know people will buy it from those sadists.

iza• 11 years ago

What is with the milk hate? Is it cool to not drink milk now?

hnnewguy• 11 years ago

What is with the milk hate? Is it cool to not drink milk now?

Most of the modern "fad" diets are against dairy. Personally, I'm torn. I'm half-convinced that it's "unnatural" for human consumption, but at the same time it's a cheap, tasty way of getting good fats and protein.

voidlogic• 11 years ago

I'm half-convinced that it's "unnatural" for human consumption

Its not like a large portion of the Earth's human population has evolved the ability to process lactose after childhood or anything--

pizza2343• 11 years ago

There is so much garb... ahem nutrition research, that it's possible to support any possible opinion.

I can't speak for the specific case, but on a general guideline, the great majority of people can reap huge benefits simply by doing sports and dropping junk/processed food. In this perspective, choosing one food [group] over another, is nothing else than bikeshedding (in other words, the bottleneck is somewhere else).

Amorymeltzer• 11 years ago

There are people who have preferences when it comes to bottled water, so I suspect there's a market for this sort of thing.

moheeb• 11 years ago

I am one of those people! Most bottled waters are fine but there are a few of lower quality. Really no different than anything else.

serve_yay2• 11 years ago

Hate, really?

Glyptodon• 11 years ago

Remember, everyone with disposable income is now lactose intolerant and gluten sensitive, even if they weren't ten years ago. Because spontaneous biological changes afflicting people based on their income level are a thing.

jonnathanson2• 11 years ago

Milk has been taking a beating for decades, as the article hints. One way to look at it is to analyze all the different occasions for which people might drink milk, and/or the different types of consumers who might consume milk. Then look at the substitutes that have replaced it for those occasions or those people. Here, without any data to support my thinking, are some hypothetical segments:

1) Health nuts. As another poster mentions, many of the fad diets that have swept the country over the past 30-odd years have taken an anti-dairy stance. Milk loses. (Ancillary: breakfast cereal has been taking a big, big hit among health-conscious consumers, and as breakfast cereal goes, so too does the milk that goes with it.)

2) Crunchies. These people have various reasons (health, the environment, etc.), but regardless, they're against processed foods, industrial farms, GMOs, non-organic anything, and so forth. As the various horrors of factory farms have come to light, these people have turned away from milk.

3) Convenience drinkers. Water and soft drinks have edged out milk as a "snack" choice. They keep better, travel better, and to many people, taste better.

4) Kids. Kids have pretty much never liked milk, despite parents' best attempts to force it on them. This is because milk, as a standalone beverage, is revolting. As parents begin to question the purported health benefits of milk, they stop subjecting their children to it.

5) Trend takers. Not health-conscious eaters per se, but rather, the kinds of eaters who just know they can't touch gluten, despite never having been tested for celiac disease. These people take their cues from the health nuts and the crunchies. If you're looking at a food trend from a Crossing the Chasm perspective, the health nuts are the early adopters, and these folks are the followers. They don't set trends, but they'll never pass up the chance to hop on a new bandwagon. CNN said something about dairy, or paleo, or gluten, or whatever, and these people are now religiously opposed to those things. It's half identity politics, and half inchoate desire to make healthier lifestyle choices. In either case, it's half hearted.

6) Ron Burgundy. It's too damned hot. Milk was a bad choice.

proveanegative• 11 years ago

This is because milk, as a standalone beverage, is revolting.

That is a patently false claim.

oh_sigh• 11 years ago

Sounds great to me. I'm not very price sensitive for beverages, and I'd drink more milk if it was lower in sugar. More protein is nice too.

pizza2343• 11 years ago

Milk is low on calories, especially in proportion to the volume. A 500 ml portion of skim milk is a little more than 150 calories, which is a "bargain", for how filling it is.

Protein content is arguably insufficient. For people in need (real or imaginary), the amount is too little per portion - for the rest of the masses, a balanced diet will give enough proteins (especially considering the average meat intake in western countries).

Reasoned approaches to balanced nutrition look elsewhere for "slashing calories".

Someone1234• 11 years ago

You realise a 500 ml Coca Cola has 210 calories, right? So calling 150 calories a bargain is a little strange. That's a high calorie drink.

It has more calories than a 500 ml coffee with cream and sugar, and much more than a black coffee or a double-black/green tea (0 calories).

Honestly milk's health effects are highly exaggerated. I don't love this article[0] and won't stand behind everything in it, however it begins to get the point across that the adverts for milk are just that: adverts.

[0] http://saveourbones.com/osteoporosis-milk-myth/

beckler• 11 years ago

weird. it's already in Atlanta. it tastes alright, not my favorite by any means, but it's cheaper than horizon organic.

Yetanfou2• 11 years ago

'premium' milk... in other words, more processed food. Which, of course, is generally something to avoid.

Maybe there is a market for a shared cow startup?

iMoo: a modern alternative for an old staple. The cow with the 'share' function. Kickstart a cow?

Or, just use your head for thinking before stuffing it with the next branded product. Buy unbranded fresh staple foods and prepare them yourself. Don't whine about your busy schedule which does not allow you to do this, see it as a challenge instead of a chore. You'll spend less money and end up healthier to boot. Invite some friends (real live ones) if you're single and don't like eating alone. If there isn't an app for that yet, maybe there should be: geo-located single hungry people who want to share their chow.

nsxwolf• 11 years ago

You can also just buy regular milk off the shelf like most people do.

kiba• 11 years ago

'premium' milk... in other words, more processed food. Which, of course, is generally something to avoid.

Your comment is all about asserting that unprocessed food is good for you. Where's the evidence?

Yetanfou2• 11 years ago

Here?

https://www.google.com/search?q=processed+food+health+issues

MengerSponge• 11 years ago

My favorite thing about Fairlife is that there isn't a speck of Coca-Cola branding on the bottle. It's like Coke's Goose Island!

thanksgiving• 11 years ago

For other readers who do not know about Goose Island Brewery either, it is a fully-owned subsidiary of Anheuser-Busch. Anheuser-Busch is the world's largest brewer and has a 25% world-wide market share.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goose_Island_Brewery

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anheuser-Busch_InBev

vertex-four• 11 years ago

Coca-Cola now have a number of brands where they attempt to distance themselves as far as possible from the brand. In the UK, they now sell "glacéau smartwater", where the labelling suggests that it is made by a company called "Energy Brands". However, said company is actually fully owned by Coca-Cola, and the only thing to betray this on the bottle is the complaints contact address.

randomname2• 11 years ago

"Casein has been documented to break down in the stomach to produce the peptide "casomorphin", an opioid."

So amping up the protein (casein) content makes the milk more addictive? :)

Perceval• 11 years ago

Depends. Milk has two types of protein: casein and whey. They may only increase whey and not casein (casein tastes much worse than whey in my anecdotal experience).

pkulak• 11 years ago

I'm pretty sure the only "sugar" in milk is lactose, so how removing the lactose only took the sugar down by 30% is beyond me.

My cynical guess is that they took out all the lactose, then replaced 70% of it with table sugar or HFCS. The irony there would be that, while the carton can still say 30% less sugar, they removed all of the sugar that acts nothing like fructose in humans (many people can't digest it, and those who can do so about as fast as they do protein) and replaced it with a bunch of fructose that was never there in the first place.

maxerickson2• 11 years ago

Their marketing material mentions lactase enzyme:

http://fairlife.com/our-products/fat-free/

So apparently they don't add HFCS. I guess they don't try to remove more because the sugar makes it taste better.

Why Coca-Cola wants to sell the world expensive “science milk”

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