Juiced

Dear Tropicana,

The Boy and I noticed that your refrigerated orange juice is no longer purely Floridian.  Yep, you've hopped on the Brazilian bandwagon, and now the orange juice you sell is a blend of North and South American juices.

Since you're combatting the small Floridian orange crop with a decreased package size (same price for less), the use of Brazilian fruit has to be a different decision.  Is it really cheaper for you to haul juice up from Brazil?  Your product is still not from concentrate.  Juice is heavy.  You're a smart company--I know you've had to have analyzed the costs in all of this.  But did you also analyze the possible consumer backlash?

Maybe nobody really notices (maybe that's what you hope).  But the Boy did, and his reaction to it was something akin to how I feel about race car driver Emerson Fittipaldi not drinking the milk after winning the Indy 500 so that he could drink orange juice and promote his orange groves (my blood still boils about this.  I can't be alone in feeling this way):  We're not buying Tropicana Pure Premium as long as it contains Brazilian orange juice.

Luckily, we've got Florida's Natural to take your place.  Not that you'll miss us.  We're just a couple of average consumers.  Just not yours anymore.

Your pal,
Jill