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June 3, 2009
Starbucks Whispers Sweet Nothings. Literally.
Starbucks Coffee has always wanted to have its half-caf, vanilla, skim latte and drink it too. But sometimes it tries too hard.
That's the case today. The international food and drink purveyor announced that it would once again reformulate its food offerings, this time to offer "real" food made with sugar instead of the illogically demonized sweetener known as corn sugar, or high fructose corn syrup.
The trouble is that beet sugar, cane sugar, and corn sugar are 100 percent equivalent in all nutritional respects. No one denies that sweeteners contain calories, or that consuming too much sugar in general will lead to weight gain. But an apple fritter is an apple fritter, not a health food.
And no matter what Starbucks’ marketing whiz kids say about a “real” apple fritter, it will still have 420 calories and 20 grams of fat.
When it comes to health and wellness – the very goals that Starbucks claims to be furthering by switching sweeteners – what matters are calories taken in and calories burned. Translation: “Total diet” and exercise. Adopting a healthier lifestyle doesn’t have to be difficult, but the reality is that there’s no corn sugar shortcut.
Hopefully, consumers are smart enough to see this for what it really is: a marketing ploy.
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