Well imagine having only three networks to watch and a set of rabbit ears for reception; or shouting instructions to your dad out the window while he crawled around on the roof to adjust the TV antennae. That was the extent of television entertainment 30 years ago.

Today, variety is something we’ve come to expect. Perhaps you’re a cupcake fanatic with a competitive streak who performs best under pressure. There’s a show for you.  Or maybe watching city slickers noodle for catfish in the muddy waters of Oklahoma is more your genre. There’s a show for you too.

Variety of entertainment, just as with food and beverages, gives life flavor. Here at Sip & Savor, we’re enjoying more variety in the beverages our member companies produce than ever before. Flavored waters, sports drinks, diet sodas, energy drinks, 100 percent juices and teas provide variety and options for maximum enjoyment to fit your lifestyle.  So, sip away and celebrate the variety!

If you want to get the more information on apple juice, we recommend you visit the “Fruit Juice Facts” website of the Juice Products Association where you’ll find everything from how FDA tests the safety of juices to an informative Q&A on apple juice safety.

You can easily freeze any 100 percent juice of juice drink, from orange to pineapple, to create delicious summertime treats.  Click here for a few recipes that we found with a quick Internet search.

Our member companies offer a range of great tasting products, including 100 percent juice, that can be a tasty and refreshing part of a balanced diet.  Check out our website to find out who makes what.

Just don’t forget to put a popsicle stick in your juice before your freeze it, or else you will be cooling off with a sticky mess!

To get you out of this jam, we at Sip & Savor would like to offer a potential solution—the fruit juice smoothie. With fruits, flavored yogurts and a wide array of juices, the combination possibilities are endless.  Why not try one of the juices our member companies make blended with fresh summertime fruit, ice and yogurt?  Or try one of these creative ideas? These delicious treats take mere minutes to blend together, and you can even prep your ingredients the night before to save even more time on hectic mornings.  Smoothies make a simple and easily portable breakfast that is sure to refresh you during the scorching mornings of summer.

Give them a try and let us know what you think!

There are also many varieties of juice drinks to choose from, which often also include vitamins and nutrients.  Lots of information on 100 percent juice, juice drinks and their ingredients can be found on our products issue site.

In addition to benefits from the vitamins and minerals included in 100 percent juice and juice drinks, drinking liquids can help you get the amount of fluids you need each day.  According to the Institute of Medicine, that number is 11-16 cups of total fluids for adult men and women, depending on your activity level and size.  Adults and children can consume a wide variety of fluids each day to reach their target goal.

To learn all about the multitude of hydrating options our industry offers, visit the ABA products issue site.  Check back with us at Sip & Savor for more ways to stay hydrated all winter long!

According to the study’s authors, adults who didn’t drink juice were more likely to fall short of the recommended intakes for several key nutrients, including vitamins A and C, and magnesium, while those who did drink juice exceeded recommended levels of bone-building calcium and potassium.

It’s easy to start including a glass of juice into your diet.  Try a glass with breakfast in the morning, or as a healthy and delicious treat during the day.  Our member companies even make low-calorie juices if you’re trying to reduce your overall calorie intake.  For even more information on 100 percent juice, juice drinks and their ingredients, please visit the ABA’s product issue site.

You can get a lot of these things from the fruits and vegetables that you should consume each day.  But there are other options as well to help you get these needed nutrients – such as 100 percent fruit juice.  In fact, 100 percent juice can help give you that nutritional bump that you’ve been missing.  Check out our products page for more information on these and other product categories.

And – from soft drink cans to 100 percent juice containers – all of our member companies’ packaging is 100 percent recyclable, so while you are on the move, don’t forget to “Think Inside the Bin.“

100 percent juice is just that – 100 percent fruit juice with no added sugar. There are also many varieties of juice drinks to choose from, many of which pack the same cold-fighting punch as 100 percent juice varieties. Even more information on 100 percent juice, juice drinks and their ingredients can be found on our product issue Web site.

And if you’re feeling creative, or want something different for breakfast, we found this great recipe site with over 180 smoothie recipes. So, you can mix your favorite whole fruits and fruit juices together. You’re sure to find one you love!

No matter what beverage you choose, keep reading Sip & Savor, where we’re delivering the latest beverage industry happenings.

A message worth heeding as the Congress comes back to work today. And the President is ready to give a big speech on health reform tonight.

If our leaders learned anything over the August recess we hope it’s that taxpayers are leery of any reform that costs them more money without giving them something they don’t already have or need or want. Regular, hard-working folks aren’t in a position to pay more for much right now – especially if there’s no value, benefit or priority in it for them.

Well, while there are some good, sound ideas for improving health care out there by lawmakers in both parties (ideas that get to lowering costs, for example), the activists have been busy with a singular focus on pushing for a tax on soft drinks and other beverages to pay for health care reform. So, heading into the next phase of this important debate, it might behoove lawmakers to keep a few facts in mind when it comes to this idea.

1.) A soft drink tax simply won’t work. There’s a book of evidence supporting this point. Just a few highlights. A.) West Virginia and Arkansas are two states with excise taxes on soda like the one being talked about in Washington. Those states have the fifth- and sixth-highest obesity rates in America, according to the CDC. B.) This week, University of Chicago researchers concluded: “Current state-level tax rates are not found to be significantly associated with adolescent weight outcomes.” C.) A George Mason University study showed that a 15-cent tax per can of soda would reduce a person’s Body Mass Index by just .02 (40 to 39.98). That’s not even measurable on a bathroom scale! D.) Even the leader of an American Heart Association panel that issued a study last week on childhood obesity conceded that there is “limited evidence” that a soft drink tax would work. We appreciate that piece of candor, which many activists lack, but as one can see, there’s actually a great deal of real-world evidence showing that a soft drink tax won’t work. Bottom line: We can’t tax our way to better health. These taxes are just a façade for a money grab, pure and simple.

2.) A soft drink tax further squeezes the middle class struggling through a recession. The tax is discriminatory and regressive. The Congressional Research Service did a study showing that the tax burden would by far be borne most by those who can least afford to pay it. Furthermore, 96 percent of the tax would be paid by low-income and middle-class families – in all, those earning less than $250,000 a year. It doesn’t seem wise to be taxing people’s groceries in the middle of a recession. Bottom line: Didn’t leaders promise not to tax the middle class in this last election?

3.) Government shouldn’t tell people what to eat. The strong majority of Americans believe it is an over-reach by government to use the tax code to tell them what to eat or drink. They don’t view it as government’s role. It’s an uninvited intrusion into basic elements of people’s lives. Bottom line: Lawmakers cross this line at their own risk. Just ask leaders in New York and Maine, whose beverage tax ideas were overwhelmingly rejected by the public.

4.) A complex health system needs comprehensive solutions. You’re not going to solve the complexities of health reform with a tax on soda pop. In fact, you’re not even going to make a dent in the problem. Bottom line: This country’s got much bigger problems if its leaders are building a new health system on such a shaky foundation as a tax on food. Seriously!

5.) It’s soda pop, for Pete’s sake. Like most foods, regular soft drinks have calories. Soda pop is a fun, refreshing beverage meant to be enjoyed. It’s nothing more, nothing less. So the money-seeking, agenda-toting, self-proclaimed we-know-what’s-best-for-everyone-busybodies should stop making soda out to be more than what it is. Our industry certainly doesn’t. The compendium of science says all calories count, regardless of the food source, when it comes to maintaining one’s weight. That’s irrefutable. And it drives the advocates crazy. Bottom line: You can be a healthy person and drink regular soda. Tens of millions of Americans are proof.

In summary, it’s not hard to let your imagination go if Congress and the President pursue a tax on soda, juice drinks, sports drinks and other beverages as some propose. (That’s right – this tax isn’t just on soda but on any beverage with even a little bit of sugar in it, including teas and juices.)

If government starts taxing simple pleasures like soda, where does its long arm stop once it realizes that didn’t work? Tax cheeseburgers? Fries? Shakes? All products with sugar? Any products with any taste? Evidence shows it still won’t change people’s behaviors; just burden them with more taxes.

Let’s focus on improving the health care system with meaningful and sustainable solutions — not with distracting one-offs like taxing people’s food. People have enough burdens right now. Leave them alone.

As the wise man said: “In an economy like this, the last thing we should do is raise taxes on the middle class.”

The goal of the coalition is to stave off attempts to impose discriminatory and regressive taxes on juice drinks, soft drinks and, ultimately, other food products; as well as to educate policy-makers and the public that taxes don’t make anyone healthy – education, exercise and balanced diets do that.

So far, some 110 organizations have joined the coalition, and as of this morning more than 21,000 individuals had signed up as well. Clearly our colleagues in other grocery and food industries, as well as the public, worry about the slippery slope a tax on juice drinks and soda would create. Once Congress reaches into the grocery basket, where will they stop in taxing food products to pay for whatever spending whim they have?

Go to the Web site – www.nobeverageandfoodtaxes.com – to learn more and sign our petition. Tell Congress to stay out of your grocery basket and pursue more meaningful ways to health care reform.

Look, we’re all optimistic, well, perhaps hopeful is the better word, that the economy needs to turn around sometime soon here. But the reality is it’s not. We still have major job losses reported every month. News of wages declining come every month, too. And the housing market is still a precarious one.

In short, people are struggling to hold onto their homes and jobs, with those jobs, their health insurance. And in doing so, they’re working hard to make ends meet by making every penny, nickel and dime count – for in this economy all this change adds up to real money.

This summer the “in” thing is the “stay-cation.” People can’t afford extras. Congress needs to take the not-so-subtle hints from families and remember those promises from the past campaign not to raise taxes on the middle class.

Therefore, as Congress works on health care reform legislation – an important and worthy endeavor – we need them to focus on meaningful and sustainable solutions to this complex problem. And we need them to stay out of our grocery baskets. First, we’re not going to solve the complexities of health care reform with a tax on soda pop. Most importantly, in an economy like this, the last thing we should be doing is raising taxes on hard-working families.

The governors of New York and Maine recently tried to impose major tax hikes on juice drinks and soda, but their efforts were strongly rebuked by the people of those states. The public couldn’t believe their lawmakers would raise taxes on them during such tough times. And people simply view it as an over-reach when government uses the tax code to tell them what to eat or drink.

So, again, check out the Americans Against Food Taxes coalition — and sign the petition telling Congress what you think of the concept of using taxes to tell you what to drink. Especially in this economy.