Product development

Since 2007, we've reduced the sugar content of the following brands:

• Fanta by 30%
• Oasis by 50%
• Lilt by 55%

Sugar and sweeteners

We are often asked about the sugar content of our products. Our products are sweetened in a number of ways:

• 36% of our products contain no sugar or are sweetened by low calorie sweeteners
• Some use sucrose, as an added ingredient
• Some contain naturally occurring fruit sugar

Developing Fanta

The Fanta brand was born around 80 years ago:

• It's available in over 90 flavours in around 180 countries
• First sugar-free version, Diet Fanta Orange released in 1997
• New, improved-tasting Fanta Orange Zero in 2004

We've also been working hard to reformulate the core brand, Fanta Orange, in response to consumer preferences. Success is largely down to the taste factor. In this case, we found that UK consumers prefer sweet-tasting orange juice drinks.

Following years of different formulations, and changes in regulations, we discovered that we could reduce the sugar content of the drink, while keeping the sweetness consumers wanted. We achieved this by using a blend of sugar and sweeteners.

Colouring

In 2008, we switched to natural colours for Fanta, using carrot and pumpkin extracts to enhance the orange colour provided by the fruit juice. Some of the challenges we had to overcome included colour fading, stability and the sourcing of the natural ingredients. The latter can be affected by availability and seasonality.

In most cases, we also had to change the type of packaging we used. In 2009 we reformulated again to remove all artificial flavours. This new version was launched in phases to make sure that each stage of change was implemented to suit consumers' tastes.