# Q: Grocery Store Soda Aisle in the 1970s **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 18, 2016, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211 "2016-08-18T20:52:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/41 "2016-08-22T15:48:53Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > You want to discuss fixes? It’s another whole topic. Sorry if I don’t play the (common) game here of being trapped into defending another poster’s arguments. I asked you to defend your arguments. No one but you and you alone suggested reducing the number of potato chips on the racks. No one but you and you alone used scare quotes around ‘freedom’ and ‘right to choose’ when asking if we really should have 10 kinds of chips or 37 different types of bottled water. I just asked you how plan to get from where we are now to where you want to be. You’ve chosen not to do that. If you don’t want to answer it, at least have some dignity and just ignore it instead if pretending like I the one that’s confused. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/42 "2016-08-22T15:56:28Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I asked you to defend your arguments. No one but you and you alone suggested reducing the number of potato chips on the racks. No one but you and you alone used scare quotes around ‘freedom’ and ‘right to choose’ when asking if we really should have 10 kinds of chips or 37 different types of bottled water. Right - I made the point and asked the question. I’m not even sure I made an argument one way or the other except that when you look past the shelf cards, the illusion of vast choice turns out to be something else. > [@](#): > > I just asked you how plan to get from where we are now to where you want to be. And I said that’s really another topic entirely, nothing much to do with anything in this thread except asking the question. You want an answer? I’ll give you an answer: social nullification. The same force that ended the idiocy of Prohibition. Brought on by counter-education challenging the assumptions about consumer needs and values brought on by sixty or so years of intense marketing efforts that have defined a world willingly screwing itself into disaster to have that endless “freedom of choice” - which is demonstrably nothing of the kind, but a complex and rigged marketing game designed to extract maximum profit from the population. You really can’t bitch about how grasping, self-serving and manipulative Donald Trump is without realizing that nearly all of the consumer goods industry is exactly the same, doing the same shuck and jive and deception to its own benefit… except that it \*has \*been “president” for many decades. But dear god, suggest that eight to ten identical products on the shelf in fierce competition is representative of a problem, and you get called a communist. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/43 "2016-08-22T18:18:48Z")
> [@delphica](#): > > The Coke and Pepsi I remember from the 1970s were in eight packs of returnable bottles that were thick glass, sterilized and refilled, and then sold in a cardboard sleeve. And even though they were thick, they sometimes _did_ break with (apparently) little contact, like setting the pack on the counter – because occasionally a bottle with a tiny crack would get past the quality control or whatever. > > Oh, we have the internet, what a remarkable thing. [This is the kind of pack](https://img0.etsystatic.com/000/0/6185250/il_fullxfull.258245062.jpg) I remember from back then. [This is what I remember.](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/a8/05/46/a80546b697a9ba6aa121179e6a9ff2a0.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/44 "2016-08-22T18:35:47Z")
> [@bump](#): > > [This is what I remember.](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/a8/05/46/a80546b697a9ba6aa121179e6a9ff2a0.jpg) I have never seen those! I wonder if regional markets were very different back then. ---
**Author:** ![Fleetwood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fleetwood/32/271_2.png) [@Fleetwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fleetwood)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/45 "2016-08-22T18:36:50Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Good find, but it may not prove quite as much as you think. \*\*So there are only 9 significant makers of potato chips in the US? \*\*That’s more than some segments, but still a pretty small number given the vast duplication of product from each maker, and between them. Some are also regional, reducing the number of makers in any given area. > > So it’s still a handful of very large food conglomerates producing a vast number of duplicate products and driving an essentially meaningless consumer competition by spending more on marketing than (in some cases) on the cost of the food materials themselves. > > If I have a single point here, starting from the beginning and ignoring demands for draft legislation to magically fix it all, it’s that (1) we have been generationally conditioned to think we have, and have an entitlement to, vast “choice,” and that a vast amount of that “choice” is an illusion fostered by intense marketing efforts. I Didn’t day that. I pointed out that among the top 10 selling chips, nine different manufacturers are represented. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/46 "2016-08-22T19:27:07Z")
> [@Fleetwood](#): > > I Didn’t day that. I pointed out that among the top 10 selling chips, nine different manufacturers are represented. I’ll concede there’s a difference but I’d bet that brands 11-999 represent a minority percentage of market share. This is easier when complete, reliable numbers are available. Highly processed numbers from 10-lists and articles with a point to make tend to both reveal and conceal. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/47 "2016-08-22T19:52:34Z")
heh you think chips and soda are bad … no ones ever noticed schwans owns about 85-90 percent of the frozen pizza aisle ? ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/48 "2016-08-22T20:03:07Z")
> [@delphica](#): > > I have never seen those! I wonder if regional markets were very different back then. Could be; that’s what I remember being available in stores from about 1976(when I was about 4 and can remember going to the store with Mom) to the advent of the plastic 2 liter bottle in the Houston area sometime in the early 1980s. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/49 "2016-08-22T20:05:27Z")
> [@nightshadea](#): > > heh you think chips and soda are bad … no ones ever noticed schwans owns about 85-90 percent of the frozen pizza aisle ? Monopoly production is only part of the issue; monopoly and oligarchic production under a wide number of seemingly competitive brand names is more significant. Even when brands are all truly competing, competing with essentially identical products is the real core of the issue. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/50 "2016-08-22T21:57:58Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Could be; that’s what I remember being available in stores from about 1976(when I was about 4 and can remember going to the store with Mom) to the advent of the plastic 2 liter bottle in the Houston area sometime in the early 1980s. That’s about the exact time period I’m thinking of … mid-70s, up through the introduction of two liter in the early-ish 80s, and I was in New York state. ---
**Author:** ![Sarahfeena](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sarahfeena/32/519_2.png) [@Sarahfeena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sarahfeena)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2016, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/51 "2016-08-22T23:21:42Z")
Yeah, it’s pretty evil of those corporations to be creating jobs for so many people. They must be stopped! ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2016, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/52 "2016-08-23T00:16:31Z")
> [@Sarahfeena](#): > > Yeah, it’s pretty evil of those corporations to be creating jobs for so many people. They must be stopped! Yes - creating jobs for people _so they can afford the output of the system_. Goody for all concerned. It doesn’t take very long in this discussion before the parroting of ingrained capitalist/consumerist dogma in a circular argument supporting that system sounds as absurd as anything from 1930s Stalinism. ---
**Author:** ![california\_jobcase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@california\_jobcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/california_jobcase)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2016, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/53 "2016-08-23T04:34:46Z")
I remember the OP’s roll-up plastic thingies. Quite amusing for a ten-year old me to play with. I taught high school science for 26 years. I loved telling the kids that we had to put a ten cent deposit on the bottles so we’d bring them back. The reaction they’d have when I’d tell them the bottles were cleaned and refilled was a hoot: “yuck! Gross! Someone else drank out of that bottle?” Ah, good times. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2016, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/54 "2016-08-23T04:49:51Z")
> [@delphica](#): > > I have never seen those! I wonder if regional markets were very different back then. I tried to make that clear in post 25, before this thread got hijacked for some kind of consumerism pissing contest. In those days, local bottlers still were in charge of what and how they sold, and some were fiercely independent. Some bottlers offered Mr. Pibb; some didn’t. Some did 32-ounce glass bottles; some did the two-liter plastic bottles they thought were the metric wave of the future. Some bet bigtime on nonreturnables; some stuck with refillable 10-ounce bottles. A few declined to switch to HFCS and continued to use cane sugar. Like small-town auto dealers who were allowed to sell both Buick and Chevy (plus Datsun), most bottlers had various brands under the same roof: The guy in third place—trying harder—with Royal Crown Cola might also bottle 7-Up, Grapette, and Dad’s Root Beer. All the various brands were still independent, until the new diet colas began the trend of line extensions, and Coca-Cola began rolling out Fanta and Mr. Pibb. In the 1980s, there was some relaxation in antitrust rules, or MBA whiz kids at Coke and Pepsi decided it would be good to start buying out the previously independent bottlers, starting with the biggest markets. This led to standardized product offerings in nearly all big cities. Additionally, I think, restaurant sales (especially fast food) came to be more important than supermarket sales, with vending machines remaining the third leg of the stool. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2016, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/55 "2016-08-23T14:13:37Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#): > > I tried to make that clear in post 25, before this thread got hijacked for some kind of consumerism pissing contest. > > In those days, local bottlers still were in charge of what and how they sold, and some were fiercely independent. Some bottlers offered Mr. Pibb; some didn’t. Some did 32-ounce glass bottles; some did the two-liter plastic bottles they thought were the metric wave of the future. Some bet bigtime on nonreturnables; some stuck with refillable 10-ounce bottles. A few declined to switch to HFCS and continued to use cane sugar. Like small-town auto dealers who were allowed to sell both Buick and Chevy (plus Datsun), most bottlers had various brands under the same roof: The guy in third place—trying harder—with Royal Crown Cola might also bottle 7-Up, Grapette, and Dad’s Root Beer. All the various brands were still independent, until the new diet colas began the trend of line extensions, and Coca-Cola began rolling out Fanta and Mr. Pibb. > > In the 1980s, there was some relaxation in antitrust rules, or MBA whiz kids at Coke and Pepsi decided it would be good to start buying out the previously independent bottlers, starting with the biggest markets. This led to standardized product offerings in nearly all big cities. Additionally, I think, restaurant sales (especially fast food) came to be more important than supermarket sales, with vending machines remaining the third leg of the stool. You DID say that, I’m sorry, I was losing track of the discussion that was about pop bottling. 😉 I must have been in a market that loved those eight packs – I remember they hung on for a long time along side the two liters, and I would be surprised when I visited other places where two liters were the main choice. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2016, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/56 "2016-08-23T15:04:48Z")
> [@](#): > > I tried to make that clear in post 25, before this thread got hijacked for some kind of consumerism pissing contest. Sorry. I tried to sidestep the hijack but it kept chasing me. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2016, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/57 "2016-08-23T16:20:21Z")
The 8 packs were for 16 oz. pint size bottles. Normal single serve [10 oz bottles](https://www.antiquesnavigator.com/ebay/images/2013/140904602766.jpg) and smaller [6.5 oz. bottles](http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/ODUxWDEyODA=/z/mgwAAOSwMmBV51UO/%24_1.JPG)were sold in 6 packs. Also large [32 oz. bottles](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/a8/05/46/a80546b697a9ba6aa121179e6a9ff2a0.jpg)were sold in 6 packs. When they were returned to stores they had to be sorted by vendor, Coke, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, etc. depending on who the distributor was for your particular store. As they were sorted they were put into [wooden](https://img1.etsystatic.com/133/1/5496051/il_340x270.1069416705_1iaj.jpg) [crates](https://img0.etsystatic.com/103/0/6953562/il_340x270.998900164_ng4d.jpg), by [vendor](http://d2ydh70d4b5xgv.cloudfront.net/images/3/0/vintage-dr-pepper-wood-crate-1961-nos-nice-hays-ks-bright-yellow-red-singles-9ef71939c56a2fa642e6ae9d2228d288.jpg). The soft drink vendors stocked the shelves themselves, this was also true for the chip vendors. The store employees, normally stocked everything else. Shelf space was allocated by the managers of the stores. If Coke was going on sale, then end-cap space or a special display may be set up, (again by the vendor employees, not the store employees) but the space was allocated by the store manager. The next week, the end cap space and display space may move to another vendor. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2016, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/58 "2016-08-24T04:19:47Z")
Thinking about where to find a photo of what we’re talking about prompted me to wonder about beer, which is still sold in cartons with six bottles. Now prior to 1980 I never lived anyplace where beer could be sold, but in the decades since I don’t ever remember seeing the retractable rolls used for beer displays. Is it just never stacked up in such tall displays as pop? ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2016, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/59 "2016-08-24T14:35:10Z")
> [@faithfool](#): > > Yeah, I still have no idea what you all are talking about, although I must’ve seen that (as I was born in '68). Anyone else have a pic? > > And thanks for trying, **RC**. I appreciate the effort. '68 baby here too, and I have no idea what it means. I realized why – we never went down the soda aisle! We drank Kool-Aid and only my parents had soda (sparingly) in larger glass returnable bottles from Stewart’s. ---
**Author:** ![AllShookDown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d9b06d/32.png) [@AllShookDown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AllShookDown)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2016, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211/60 "2016-08-25T14:27:19Z")
My co-worker worked in a grocery store as a youth in the 70’s. He knows what we’re talking about but he said they didn’t use them at his store and he doesn’t know what they might have been called. Pop just sat on the shelves where he worked. 6-packs of bottles might have been more of a 60’s thing. I remember my dad would bring home a 6-pack of Diet Rite every Friday. Since there were five of us kids, we had to come up with creative ways to deal with the 6th bottle. I miss cyclamates. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/q-grocery-store-soda-aisle-in-the-1970s/763211.md?page=4)