I love orange juice. I really, really love it. Generally speaking, it is the only beverage that I keep in my house that is not water or alcohol. That includes milk, by the way, which I despise, but that’s fodder for another post altogether. Like many OJ drinkers, I am a brand loyalist. I’ve never really tried many other brands, as I grew up drinking Tropicana and have never seen the need to stray.
My quality of life greatly increased around 10 years ago when Tropicana introduced their “low acid” OJ. It’s all I will drink now, as I have a bit of a nervous stomach and the regular juice was starting to give me acid reflux. What I love most is that the low acid orange juice isn’t pumped full of chemicals, it is just made with naturally less acidic oranges and tastes just as delicious as the normal OJ (especially with toast and peanut butter).
However, I have a beef to pick with Tropicana…
Recently, Tropicana redesigned their packaging. Yes, I am naturally resistant to change, but something as trivial as a packaging redesign wouldn’t normally phase me. The problem lies in the fact that the new packaging is so poorly redesigned that I end up staring at the rack of juice cartons before I can find the low acid orange juice. I’ve attached a picture of the new carton with this post. Looks nice doesn’t it? Too bad every carton looks exactly like that one! For reference, check out Tropicana’s product page.
See that tiny colored bar across the very top of the carton? That’s the only part of the packaging that changes. Well, not exactly the only part. Some of the subtle text does change, describing each different carton, but they are so subtle that they barely register in my brain when I look from carton to carton.
I really shouldn’t complain too much. It probably takes up 10 to 15 seconds of my day to stand there making sure that I grab my low acid juice, but I’m a very busy person! I can’t stay mad at Tropicana, though. It’s far too delicious. I still love you, Trop.
Clacked by Bob Degon
on Jan 26, 2009 @ 18:20 EST5EDT
OK, I noticed that packaging change too, and I think I know why they did it. It looks like generic packaging to me, so now there are probably a bunch of poor schleps out there who will buy Tropicana by mistake when they actually mean to buy the generic brand. not a coincidence, methinks, with the economy the way it is.