Although Americans drink more orange juice than consumers in other countries, annual orange juice consumption in the U.S. has fallen to its lowest point in at least 18 years. Demand has decrease due to the growing popularity of sports drinks and diet sodas, and consumer’s wanting to avoid the added sugar content in the juice. Consumption peaked in 2000 at 1.6 billion gallons, but has since waned. Over the past ten years demand has fallen eight times, and in the year that began October 1, 2014, demand is forecast to fall by 1.1% to 925 million gallons. Over the past decade the U.S. market for orange juice shrank by 21%, and since 2004 sales for Tropicana fell by a third to $1.4 billion and sales for Minute Maid fell by 27% to $927.5 million. Although consumption is falling, production is falling at an even quicker pace. Last season Florida production fell by 22% to 104.6 million boxes because of drought and the negative effects of citrus greening disease – ten years ago the harvest was 242 million boxes. To read further about how industry players are vying for remaining market share, and how investors are exiting the market:
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