It's Not The Real Thing - Water or Oil

So many jingles. So many products. So much money. So much political correctness.

Almost 11 months to the day, I wrote this post:
"Get Your Fat Ass Off The Bus -But Buy a Pepsi When You Get To School"

I thought I could expose a bit of hypocrisy within the system.

Today, the St. Pete Times has this: Hillsborough schools remove soda from vending machines

According to the article, "Pepsi has a 12-year, $50-million exclusive contract with Hills­borough schools".

And there is this: "Pepsi will offer only water to elementary students in Hillsborough. Middle school students can choose between water and 10-ounce servings of 100 percent juice products.

At high schools, Pepsi will sell diet soft drinks and low-calorie juices and teas. Sports drinks and fruit juices will be available in sizes no larger than 12 ounces."

It has been a while since I have been to an elementary school. Where are the "water machines" placed in the school? Are they next to the water fountains? Maybe a better question would be "are there any water fountains?". For now at least?

I know the public school system is not a business... sort of. But it seems like there are savvy business deals and contracts cut everyday within the public school system.

I've been thinking. The public school system could save money if they didn't install water fountains in their new buildings. But wait, there is more. Starting with our most treasured product (elementary kids), if they could not find water any where on campus except in one of those "water machines", it would stand to reason that sales of "water bottles" would go up. The Pepsi Corporation could recoup their investment.

Sort of like suppy and demand. Control the supply source and you can demand higher prices. It works for the oil industry is what I keep hearing.

And of course this shift of supply would not happen quickly, because it might get public attention. I think Barrack Obama made a comment that the only thing he didn't like about the increased gas prices was that it happened to quickly. We are pretty well assured that our local politicians and business people...sort of.. are very savvy people. They know how to make a plan work.


$50 million dollars is a lot of money. I wonder what else is in the contract between Pepsi and HCPS. And, I wonder who wrote it.