If your family drinks soda, how much do you spend each year?

[MommyX8]

When dh and I got married and started having children, we had two rules that we enforced. No soda and no gum. We used to give the high schoolers permission to drink soda on youth group activities when nothing else was available. After a lifetime of no carbonation, they never really liked it. But now in the wake of HFCS and scary artificial sweeteners, that offer is off the table. On a side note, we had no problem with the no gum rule until my 2nd oldest got her braces off and the orthodontist gave her gum. Are you kidding me??

 

So anyway, I went to the farm to pick up our raw milk with my 14 year old boy. We get 8 gallons a week and this boy drinks half of it. I mentioned that we spend just over $2000 for milk each year.

 

Then he says that he thinks that it totally fine since we are the only people he knows that don't drink soda. I mentioned his comment to dh and he found it quite interesting. So now we are trying to figure out how much people spend on soda.

 

We are thinking that 2 liter bottles are the cheapest. But that usually isn't the only method that people buy soda in. Figuring fast food, restaurants, convenience stores, soda machines, etc.

 

He found that the average American drinks 50 gallons of soda each year. He also found that one soda had double the amount of "daily allowable" sugar and that one or more sodas per day raises the risk of diabetes in children SIGNIFICANTLY.

 

So how much do you spend?

[QueenCat]

More than I'd like to admit..... and I'm the main soda drinker in the house. Most of the family only drinks it when we eat out. I buy 6 2liter bottles of Diet Pepsi just for me each week. Usually there is one bottle left, recently, sometimes two. It's half of what I used to drink... I used to drink 2 bottles a day. I know it's not good for me, so no need for any of you to chastise me.

[Georgiana Daniels]

Quick calculation--$195 a year. Oops!

 

Growing up, my parents only allowed me to have one a week. When I got old enough to decide for myself, I went overboard. WAY overboard. I've cut back some, but I'll always enjoy it.

[Carrie12345]

Dh and I drink canned soda. I spend an average of $3/12pk, and I'd estimate that we go through 1.5-2 packs/wk. 52x2x3= $312

 

I'm sure dh buys more when he's at work. Maybe even another $300 over the course of a year. So nowhere near $2,000 in soda. But we do go through 3-4 gallons of milk each week. Probably in the area of $800/yr. We don't buy raw and usually don't buy organic, but we are trying to cut down on milk in favor of water.

 

I'm of the mind that kids don't need other-mammal milk. Dh disagrees. ;)

[Annie]

We never buy soda for the house, but either my husband or I will usually get one if we go out. Sometimes both of us will have one.

 

For the sake of easy math, we'll call it one soda per week for each of us, at a cost of $2 per soda.

 

52 weeks * 2 people * $2 = $208

[Snickerdoodle]

Growing up, my parents only allowed me to have one a week. When I got old enough to decide for myself, I went overboard. WAY overboard.

 

My parents let us have soda once in a blue moon. As an adult I still don't have a taste for it and would never choose it.

 

Funny how different people react to similar situations.

 

:grouphug:

[Parrothead]

This was one of the things pointed out on Food, Inc. It is way cheaper to buy crap (soda, twinkies) than it is to buy milk and veggies.

 

At my worst I never spent $2000 a year on Mt. Dew, and I was a chain drinker. Probably no more than $500/year.

[Lara in Colo]

I buy canned soda once a yr (4th of July) when it goes on a great sale and usually buy 10-12 packs. That will last over the entire year with some left over. I have 4 children and I buy a 2 liter bottle every week, they each get one glass on Friday night hotdog/movie night and one more glass on Sat pizza night. I saw a pbs show a long time ago that showed children with overly strict parents with regards to treats would gorge on sweets given the chance, but those that had treats were blase about he whole thing. I aim for the second without going overboard. So for a family of 6 we spend about 22+52= about $75 yr on soda. Don't get me started on milk and koolaid.

 

Lara

[Crissy]

I spend about $150 a year.

My older son is the only one who drinks soda, and just one can a day.

 

I buy Hansens. It's a little more expensive than Coke, Pepsi or the store brands, but it has no caffeine, preservatives, colors or HFCS.

 

 

We are thinking that 2 liter bottles are the cheapest. But that usually isn't the only method that people buy soda in. Figuring fast food, restaurants, convenience stores, soda machines, etc.

 

 

We don't eat fast food and we usually only eat in restaurants 4 or 5 times a year. I don't use convenience stores or vending machines in general.

Edited March 26, 2010 by Crissy

[nova147]

DH and I drink soda - probably 3-4 cans a day between the two of us. And another 3-4 sodas a week when we are eating out/driving though somewhere. We pay about $3.50/12 pack and $2 when we're out. That's $425 for cans and $415 for glasses -- a total of $840/year. Yikes!

 

The kids aren't really old enough to ask for soda yet. I suppose we will probably let them have it in a few more years. But we drink diet soda, and I prefer to give them artificial sweeteners over the loads of sugar in regular soda. When I was a teenager, we could have one can a day (at home -- my parents didn't really try to monitor what we drank outside the home and/or paid for ourselves). With younger ones, I suppose we will limit them to one or two a week.

[aggieamy]

I usually buy a six-pack of soda at Whole Foods once or twice a month and then hide them. I let the kids split one and DH and I get one on our Saturday evening game nights. So we usually go through two six-packs every month. That's $5.00*12=$60 a year. Sometimes DH will get one over lunch when he's out with coworkers but that comes out of his personal blow money so I don't know how much it is but I bet it's pretty cheap. Also, I don't buy soda with HFCS in it. The Whole Foods stuff has cane sugar.

 

We go through a gallon of milk a week and we also buy raw milk so that's $7*52=$364 a year on that. I also supplement our raw milk with rice milk and almond milk but I don't have a figure on that. When my girls get older (or when we have more kids!) I'm sure our numbers will increase and probably rival yours!

 

Sounds like we could be friends - I don't allow gum in my house either. Yuck!

Edited March 26, 2010 by aggieamy

[Desert Rat]

I would say about $300 for the year. We drink about 2-12 pks. a week for adults. My boys don't drink pop except a root beer on pizza/movie night. The kids drink regular pop. Dh and I drink diet. I know it's not good for us. I know there's better things we could drink. We do drink lots of water too. But I love my Diet Coke! :p

[Tap]

Ds15 doesn't drink carbonated soda but he will drink soda foutain lemonade sometimes (I diferentiate this between real lemonade like Odwalla). Usually he drinks and prefers water. I would say over the year he drinks less that $5 worth of 'soda'.

 

DD11 loves soda and I have to limit her to 1 a week or 2 a week if it is juice based. She is not allowed to have anything caffinated. I sometimes will get her 7-up but I also buy natural soda or carbonated juice like Izzys, that doesn't have HFCS in them. Because the natural sodas are much more expensive, I could say $50-100 per year for her.

 

I drink about a Coke a day and don't usually finish it. I buy the cane sugar based Coke and it runs almost a $1 a bottle. I will also drink Coke if I eat out. So, that is about $400 per year.

 

Dh drinks it rarely so I can figure $20 for him because it is most likely in a restaurant.

 

Total that is about $550 per year. But that is also about a dollar a soda. I have friends who easily drink $500 worth of the HFCS variety which is 4x the number of cans.

[Chris in VA]

Regarding gum--a certain type of ingredient is actually proven to help tooth decay--our dentist actually told us tiny cavaties can be "healed" thru chewing it.

 

Soda--Diet only here, no caramel coloring preferred, but I still drink too much of it. Caffeine free, also.

We get a 12 pk every week, spending about 3 bucks, and then we get a little more around the holidays (gingerale for special occasions as we are a dry household now), so I'd estimate we spend around $200-225 a year.

Never gave it to the kids--my boys drink it occasionally.

[Snickerdoodle]

Regarding gum--a certain type of ingredient is actually proven to help tooth decay--our dentist actually told us tiny cavaties can be "healed" thru chewing it.

.

 

Xylitol

[LisaKinVA]

Soda is CHEAP. Even cheaper when you home brew it... although we can make it healthier by using Stevia instead of sugar (other than the 5 TBLS needed for the yeast to eat and create the carbonation). :D

[lynn]

Under $300 for the year. in 12pks, 2liters and other. I do however buy OJ and other juice at about $7.00 - $10 a week and organic milk at $12-$18 a week. All this comes to under $2000. My kids drink a lot of water.

[AngieW in Texas]

My dh drinks a lot of Mountain Dew. I buy 4-5 12-packs for him every time I go to the grocery store (every two weeks). The 12-packs run around $3.50, if I remember right, so that's $350-450 annually.

 

My youngest buys one 20-ounce bottle of Sprite each week. I think it runs about $1.50, so that's about $75 annually.

 

My oldest used to drink sodas, but stopped a long time ago. My middle won't touch anything that's carbonated. I used to have one root beer every day, but stopped when the taste suddenly changed on me. I'm pretty sure the taste issue was all on my end, because I'd already had half of that 12-pack when they started tasting extremely syrupy to me.

 

My 14yo and I have a smoothie just about every day. Those are pretty expensive. I buy 2-3 gallons of orange juice, 5 bags of frozen mixed berries, 3 bags of frozen cherries, and 4-5 bananas each shopping trip (every two weeks) to make our daily smoothies. I think I spend about $30 for what I need to make two weeks of smoothies, so that would be $750 annually. It's expensive, but at least it's healthy.

Edited March 26, 2010 by AngieW in Texas

[Renthead Mommy]

We don't buy soda for the house. My husband will occassionally bring one single home for himself if I am making pizza or something it goes really well with. I get a few sips. He will order soda out.

 

My inlaws however would buy 4 12 packs (48 cans!) of soda every week. He'd take one to work a day (so maybe 5-6 a week). She drank the rest. 40 sodas a week! Oh and they were always out of soda when they went shopping on Sundays. Plus they'd get soda when they went out to dinner.

 

I have no clue how much that cost in money, but 20 or so years of drinking 40+ diet, caffine free sodas a week took it's toll on MIL's brain. She ended up with Alzheimer and we all think the aspartame or whatever artificial sweeteners used it had a lot to do with it.

[Subterranean Society]

I'll get the free diet soda with my Polish Sausage from Costco; it used to be about every three months. After reading Ominvore's Dilemna and watching Food, Inc., I don't buy hot dogs anymore. Man I miss those hot dogs somedays.

 

My kids would enjoy some of the diet soda and somehow thought it was good, it's terrible. Sometimes we make our own carbonated water and add it to juice. They like that process.

[Old Dominion Heather]

We probably spend about $200 - $300 a year on soda, but my kids don't drink juice at all, so we don't buy it. They have one glass of whole milk a day and have water the rest of the time. We drink lots of iced tea (sweetened with sugar) in the summer.

 

I grew up drinking soda, one a day (or more). Dh was not allowed to have soda. Guess which of us is now pre-diabetic?

 

 

 

 

That would be my husband. I'm in good health.

[Pretty in Pink]

I'd say around $50-60/yr, because dh usually drinks about one per week. Our dc rarely to never get soda unless we are visiting someone's home and it is offered. When we eat out they get half sweet/half unsweet tea or water.

 

We do buy Organic Valley milk exclusively @ 3.39 per half gallon and I just added it up; it comes to under 1200.00/yr. We go through 3 gallons a week for a family of 6. Raw milk must be expensive, because I thought we were spending a lot but we're no where near 2000.00.

[Melissa in Australia]

soda must be a lot cheaper there than here!

I have never liked soda, I only drink water. My children occasionally make ginger beer themselves. but apart from that we don't get any. I just think it has no nutritional benefit at all, and it is just drinking carbs, with food colouring. I personally would rather have water and a piece of chocolate!

[Thea]

Not much. We have soda when we have pizza (1x a month or so) or when we go out to eat. There isn't soda in the house on a daily basis.