The next time the school bell rings and students flood into your store, pay attention to what they buy. It may be different from what they bought a few years ago. Those teens and tweens may be handing you wadded up bills to pay for – gasp – healthier beverages.
Or maybe not. It all depends on where you are and what your local school districts are doing about school beverage guidelines – particularly those defined by the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, former President Bill Clinton and the American Beverage Association.
The agreement – which sets standards for what beverages should and shouldn’t be available in schools –developed as an almost inevitable consequence of America’s growing awareness of its growing waistlines. Politicians and pundits have railed about childhood obesity for years, with targets ranging from Lunchables to Marshmallow Fluff. In 2005, nutritionists noted that America’s rising obesity rates coincided with their rising consumption of high-fructose corn syrup. After that, it was only a matter of time before experts chose the beverage industry as the next target in the battle for fit and trim kids.
But ABA leaders – with a little help from the most popular president since John F. Kennedy – turned their time in the cross-hairs into an opportunity to lead. The Association shook hands with the Alliance for a Healthier Generation in May 2006 on guidelines that will, among other things, eliminate full-calorie sodas from schools. The goal of this landscape-changing agreement is to reduce childhood obesity and diabetes by teaching kids to eat and drink healthier products.
“We like to hope that in several years they might be looking for that bottled water or that diet drink or that mid-calorie drink when they’re hanging out at the 7-Eleven,” said Brian Herr, executive director of the Alliance.