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Diet drinks in bars and restaurants

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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
SacredHeart

SacredHeart

Senior Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1
Now, I don't know about anyone else, but I'm personally not a huge purveyor of alcoholic drinks. So one thing I've been finding increasingly frustrating is the lack of diet drink options in bars and restaurants when I've been out and about. So far it seems that my options boil down to either water or diet coke. Or diet coke...or water.

It seems to me in light of the general way we're being encouraged to cut back on sugar all the time (overall, not just diabetics), and that there's such a push to reduce binge drinking, drink driving, etc, etc, that bars and restaurants would do well to offer a wider range of low/no sugar options. It would benefit a lot of people, not just us.

A friend of mine suggested approaching The One Show with this, as Dominic Littlewood might be sympathetic towards the cause. I know it's not necessarily going to get picked up, but you never know what might come of it - I mean, look at the difference making your voice heard made to the Change 4 Life advertising!

Would anyone else be interested in trying to approach this with me, or am I chasing a lost cause do you think?
 
hi sacred i am totally with you like you say they is very little choice for us who dont drink alchoholic beverages etc etc i myself dont touch it at all and i do find the places we go i am ended up with a water or at best a diet coke it gets so boring
 
Ah yes, well what do you expect from The Daily Fail? Sorry, but my distaste for the Fail knows no bounds.

However, that's actually not a bad article, as I mentioned over in the news forum. I think Dominic Littlewood isn't a bad spokesperson for diabetes. However that commenter should be hung from the rafters by their toes. Grrr
 
Bev,

the lack of light or diet drinks not only in pubs and the likes is terrible, its also the case in garages, where there is coke or pepsi and whooo there is diet pepsi or pepsi max and/or diet coke or coke zero - yippee!

Why they can't at least sell plain, good old lemonade, rather than sprite or 7up I haven't worked out.

Tesco is also bad for stocking the 0.5 litre bottles of soft drinks, especially diet variations... I use these size drinks in the car. Now, I decant a large bottle into the .5l bottles as its sooo much cheaper - but you can't do that in a pub!

There needs to be something done about this.

Good luck!
 
Einstein said:
Bev,

the lack of light or diet drinks not only in pubs and the likes is terrible, its also the case in garages, where there is coke or pepsi and whooo there is diet pepsi or pepsi max and/or diet coke or coke zero - yippee!

Why they can't at least sell plain, good old lemonade, rather than sprite or 7up I haven't worked out.

Tesco is also bad for stocking the 0.5 litre bottles of soft drinks, especially diet variations... I use these size drinks in the car. Now, I decant a large bottle into the .5l bottles as its sooo much cheaper - but you can't do that in a pub!

There needs to be something done about this.

Good luck!
Click to expand...

totally agree about tesco the amount of times i have walked down the drink aisle looking for abit of variety away from diet coke and came away empty handed is disgusting , these peopls in these stores need to realise what they stock in there shops has to cover all bases they are a hell of alot of us diabetics out there we need choices as well
 
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Today i got cream soda, dandelion and burdock, cherryade,limeade, and cloudy lemonade - all sugar free from Sainsburys, can also get them in asda. But they dont have them in smaller bottles or cans.😡Bev
 
goodness me dandelion and burdock not had that since i was little, i tend to do more of my shopping in asda these days and i go for the squashes seems more variety on flavour on them
 
Yeh we get squashes too - and Alex is totally fed up of diet coke or water when we are out aswell. Anyway, off to check him before bed - night night!:D Bev


p.s. I have been making him lolly ices with the lemonade and they are really nice if you add a bit of extra sugar free squash!:D
 
night bev ty for that tip would be nice as i have little lad who would really like them and it has been the perfect weather xx

sweetdreams
 
I too am with you there. I had an argument in a cafe Just yesterday over this.
I don't drink alcohol, tea or coffee, can't stand diet coke either yuk.
I get a big variety of no added sugar drinks in Morrisons, they have a fantastic choice of drinks there i get 2 2litre bottles for 80p
I am writing to trading standards to see where i go from there.
The lack of these drinks is dreadfull.
 
bev said:
Today i got cream soda, dandelion and burdock, cherryade,limeade, and cloudy lemonade - all sugar free from Sainsburys, can also get them in asda. But they dont have them in smaller bottles or cans.😡Bev
Click to expand...


Waitrose do big bottles of a variety of diet drinks and also ginger beer and a few others in cans..

Not good is it?
 
sweetsatin said:
I too am with you there. I had an argument in a cafe Just yesterday over this.
I don't drink alcohol, tea or coffee, can't stand diet coke either yuk.
I get a big variety of no added sugar drinks in Morrisons, they have a fantastic choice of drinks there i get 2 2litre bottles for 80p
I am writing to trading standards to see where i go from there.
The lack of these drinks is dreadfull.
Click to expand...

Its not really anything to do with trading standards, in reality its customer demand and what a buyer considers the customer base consuming.

If they only have coke or diet coke then people will buy one or the other. If they then have 10 other soft drinks, they will probably sell only a few cans more and will find some lines just won't sell, so they are left with old stock reaching its use by date.

The one way is to ensure the we don't buy drinks with meals and get everyone to do this.. over time the business owners must realise that for 3 days their sale of soft drinks just stopped.

A national awareness campaign is needed, perhaps DUK is a good engine to use.

Maybe, there is a lump of legislation, the Disability Descrimination Act (DDA) includes diabetics as disabled. If a business has no choice of product or access to their service to disabled customers then they could be prosecuted under the DDA.

Other than that, I can think of no other legislation could force them to change - purely customer demand!
 
bev said:
Yeh we get squashes too - and Alex is totally fed up of diet coke or water when we are out aswell. Anyway, off to check him before bed - night night!:D Bev


p.s. I have been making him lolly ices with the lemonade and they are really nice if you add a bit of extra sugar free squash!:D
Click to expand...

hey thanks for the tip Bev , I'll be trying that when ive been shopping

tomorrow , Ive got a lolly making thingy in the cupboard . I'll let you all know

how it goes .. 🙂🙂
 
Well i usually drink Vodka or diet coke , or diet pepsi anyway, it would be

nice to have more choice though and I will back anything you have planned .

just let me know in the thread or PM me :D🙂🙂
 
a twist on this thread is that I no longer accept 'on tap' diet coke as I have been given regular coke by mistake.

now when I go out I tend to stick to bottled water or bottled sparkling water, bottled or canned diet drinks, and yes, there is a limited supply of diet drinks in many pubs.

my local Morrisons store has rows of diet drinks, abeit they are all 2 litre bottles. I personally do not like the size, as unless you drink them within a day of opening, they are flat - but at least I have a choice.

as Einstein says - change by public demand is the only way forward. I have seen this first hand, as I could never find an alternative to wheat, and there were never any gluten free foods. I kicked up a stooshie (a fuss) and now there is a whole range. Now I do not think my local store changed just on my say so, but it added weight to the argument.

people power rules

Hazel
 
Yes Hazel people power works and we have large numbers of diabetics who

all want the same so we should be able to do something surely. 🙂
 
I only drink diet coke so haven't noticed the lack of other drinks in bars etc but on a recent holiday i was given regular coke from a machine and told it was diet.. luckily we noticed and the lady appologised. Anyway i'm only going to have drinks from machines if i can see them pouring it!

Good luck on your plight, think the One show would take up this story.

Julie x
 
I love diet coke/pepsi max so it doesn't bother me usually when out in pubs/restaurants. Although I do like an archers and lemonade on occasion, and I've never come across a diet lemonade in a pub, so have to just go with the full sugar version.

I have been given normal coke by mistake a few times, but they have always changed it with no fuss.

Anyone know how many carbs in those J20 drinks? I don't normally drink fruit juice but they are watered down aren't they? so maybe not too bad?
 
In my neck of the woods, we can often also get the great stallwart - Diet Irn Bru! (Our other national drink here.)

I recently once managed a diet Sprite, but think they must have made a mistake with their order as they have never had it since 🙂

When we used to go out (20 years ago or thereabouts), my husband and I used to ask for 2 Diet Cokes and if they said no, we BOTH had tap water. It took a lot of persevering, but eventually one day, the place said they had Diet Coke 😎. We were so pleased and went home feeling we had really achieved something!
 
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