giants reconsider marketing
Cola
tactics on school campuses
by Martha Groves
Los Angeles Times
March 13, 2001
Coca-Cola Co. on Wednesday will
announce changes in the way it mar
kets products in public schools - an
attempt to address complaints from
parents and others about fatty, sugary
snacks and excessive commercialism
on campus
Among other shifts, the com
pany said it will urge its bottlers
not to seek exclusive contracts
with districts and will promote
a wider array of beverages, in-
cluding more with calcium and
vitamins. It will also make avail
able vending machines featuring
a school mascot or commercial-
free glass fronts, rather than the
Coca-Cola logo.
In recent years, cash-strapped
districts nationwide have nego
tiated lucrative, exclusive contracts
with soda and snack vendors.
Big high schools have reaped as
much as $lOO,OOO a year in extra rev
enues to buy band uniforms, fund
field trips and support team sports.
Under the exclusive contracts, the
more cans of soda or bottles of juice
drinks sold, the more money for
schools.
But the arrangement has increas
ingly come under fire from parents,
school leaders and legislators, who
note the hypocrisy of preaching good
nutrition in the classrooms while ped
dling empty calories in the halls.
They point to research linking soft
Solar power shines amid energy crisis
by Hugo Martin
Los Angeles Times
March 14,2001
Solar power, believed by many to have gone out of style
vvith tie-dyed shirts and love-ins, is back in fashion, thanks
largely to California’s energy crisis.
Throughout the state, dealers and manufacturers of so
lar panel systems are reporting an increase in sales. State
and local grant programs for residents and business own
ers who install such systems have been inundated with
applications.
“We can’t get them in fast enough,” said Steve
Radenbaugh, owner of Los Angeles-based Bilt-Well Root
ing and Solar, who recently hired extra workers to handle
a doubling of orders for solar electricity systems in the
past month.
The biggest drawback to rooftop solar energy systems
has always been the high cost, with typical residential set
ups costing $15,000 to $BO,OOO. At such prices, it can take
15 years or more to pay off the investment in energy sav
ings.
But with new rebate programs and
the threat of higher energy rates, such
an investment has become more at-
tractive
The renewed interest in solar is re
flected in a 500 percent increase in
grant applications to the state’s $56-
million solar rebate program, which
received 250 applications in January,
according to officials at the Califor
nia Energy Commission. The in
creased interest has forced Gov. Gray
Davis to pledge another $5O million
to keep the program from running out
of funds.
Only 100 Los Angeles residents
have received rebates from the De
partment of Water and Power’s $BO
million solar rebate program, which
was launched last year. But in recent
months, the number of people who
have requested applications has
doubled to nearly 1,000 per month.
“All this brouhaha about the energy
: crisis has made people aware of what
their alternatives are,” she added.
Solar energy generates a fraction of
the 262,000 gigawatt-hours of elec
tricity that Californians use each year.
Still, the power supplied by solar en
ergy has increased gradually, from 810
gigawatt-hours in 1997 to 954 in 1999,
according to state figures.
A typical 2,000-watt solar energy
system can supply a 1,500-square-foot
home with up to 60 percent of its
power, according to experts. The
amount of electricity generated by a
solar system depends on the amount
; of sunshine.
Still, a 2,000-watt system can cost
$ 15,000. A typical state rebate can cut
, that cost to $9,000.
' But even then, it can take 15 years
: or more of utility bill savings for a so
• lar system owner to break even on the
; investment, according to solar panel
! dealers.
The payback period could be
drinks to childhood obesity and a
sharp increase in the incidence of
adult-onset diabetes.
The U.S. Department of Agricul
ture in January issued a stern report
to Congress recommending that all
snacks sold in schools meet the fed-
eral government's nutritional stan
dards.
“One of the biggest challenges
"One of the biggest challenges school
meal program managers face is the com
petition vvith foods that are marketed
to children through multimillion-dollar,
glitzy and sophisticated advertising
campaigns."
-U.S. Dept, of Agriculture report
school meal program managers face
is the competition with foods that are
marketed to children through multi
million-dollar, glitzy and sophisti
cated advertising campaigns," the re
port stated.
A Coca-Cola official said the com
pany is attempting to address the con
cerns of parents and educators.
“Companies that have considered
schools as a marketing opportunity
need to reconsider," said Jeffrey
Dunn, president of Coca-Cola North
America, a division of Coca-Cola Co.,
based in Atlanta. "The pendulum has
swung too far.’
Dunn added that bottlers are "on
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board” with the policy shift. They are
independent companies, however, and
Bill Marks, a Coca-Cola spokesman,
acknowledged that "if this movement
doesn’t take off, you might (continue
to) see exclusives.”
A Pepsi spokesman, Larry
Jabbonsky, said his company has
taken or is considering some of the
same steps. He took exception to crit
ics who maintain that the push
for exclusivity has come from
the cola giants.
“It has been a school, a dis-
gains than an opportunity to
build brand loyalty. School sales
accounted for only about 1 percent of
Coca-Cola's sales of 5.1 billion cases
of beverages in the most recent fiscal
year.
schools.
“It’s a case of'helping out the
schools with money that students
would already otherwise be spending
off campus," said Dick Van Der Laan,
a spokesman for Long Beach Unified
School District in California. “The
schools themselves can offer the
healthier alternatives, but the reality
is the students do buy junk food and
empty calories."
slashed dramatically if electricity rates rise - a possibility
that is on the minds of many recent solar converts.
That was the case with
Mark lrw in, a contractor from
Agoura Hills, Calit., who de
scribed his family of four as
energy hogs." They had regu- we " as t 0 save money
lariy racked up electricity bills Solar panels, also known as
of $l6O per month, he said. solar photovoltaic systems,
Like others who have re- use silicon cells installed in
cently purchased solar sys- rooftop panels to convert sun
tems, Irwin had long consid- light i nto electricity. For that
ered making such an invest- reason, experts recommend
ment, but he hesitated until the that solar systems be
energy crisis struck. mounted on homes with at
"I firmly believe our rates l east 300 square feet of un
are going to go up," he said. obstructed roof area facing
In January, Irwin bought a LOS ANGELES TIMES PHOTO BY BORIS YARO south or west.
$36,000 solar system that can Mgrk !rwin 0 f Agoura Hills, Calif., near Los Angeles, got solar Most solar electric systems
generate a peak output of 4.4 panels for his family of “energy hogs." Fellow contractor George are wired into a home s meter,
kilowatts - enough, he said, to Nikolas checks the work. If the panels generate more
coye3r your tott,
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WORLD & NATION
trict or consortiums of districts
getting together and dangling
exclusivity to generate the most
money from a given supplier,”
Jabbonsky said.
For cola companies, the
school contracts represent less a
chance for short-term revenue
The debate poses a conundrum for
Nevada population swells
to nearly 2 million
by Tom Gorman
Los Angeles Times
March 13, 2001
LAS VEGAS - Led by a tripling of its Latino residents,
the population of Nevada - the nation’s fastest-growing
state - has ballooned to nearly 2 million people, a 66.3
percent increase since 1990, according to U.S. Census fig
ures released Tuesday.
Most of that growth occurred in Clark County, allow
ing the Las Vegas region to further manhandle the bal
ance of the state on political and financial issues.
Clark County, with 1,375,765 residents, now accounts
for nearly 69 percent of the state’s total population. The
population of the county has eclipsed the rest of the state
since 1980, but the trend has continued with the surge of
new Las Vegas Strip casinos in the past decade and, in its
wake, the resident work force that followed.
For all its open spaces, Nevada’s population is heavily
concentrated in its urban counties, and that concentration
grew in the past decade. About 86 percent of the state’s
residents live in either Clark County or Washoe County,
around Reno, compared to about 83 percent in 1990.
The state’s population has also become more ethnically
diverse, a change that has not been lost on Las Vegas’
casino owners, at least one of whom is now marketing
specifically to the local Asian population.
Among the various ethnic groups, the number of Asians,
Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders in Nevada has about
tripled, from 35,897 in 1990 to between 96,362 and
122,457 in 2000, about 6 percent of the population. Fig
ures on race and ethnicity from the 2000 census are re
ported as ranges because, for the first time, people were
allowed to report themselves as belonging to more than
one group.
The state’s Latino population is also up sharply. In 1990,
Latinos - with a population of 124,419 - made up 10.4
percent of the state’s residents. By 2000, the number ol
slash the energy bills at his 2,400-square-foot home by
more than half. With the state rebate, he paid S24,(XX) for
[tuition]
the system.
I But Irwin said the
purchase was intended to
help save the environment as
FRIDAY, MARCH 16, 2001
Latinos had roughly tripled, to between 355,452 and
393,970, or 17.8 percent to 19.7 percent of the popula
tion.
The dramatic increase in the Latino population should
put politicians on notice that those voters will need to be
reckoned with, elected officials say.
Now it is time for them to become politically involved,
said Dario Herrera, chairman of the Clark County Board
of Commissioners - and one of only three Latino elected
officials in southern Nevada. The other two are a school
board member and a state legislator.
Jeff Hardcastle, the state demographer, said the bur
geoning Latino population in southern Nevada is stoked
by the availability of jobs in new home construction and
service jobs in the hotels and casinos.
"That’s the story of Nevada’s growth: job creation,” he
said. The question that will be resolved when additional
census data are released, he said, is whether the Latinos
have moved to Nevada from California or directly from
other countries.
The census showed that the state’s black population
was between 131,-509 and 150,508 - between 6.6 percent
and 7.5 percent of the population. Whites numbered be
tween 1,303,001 and 1,366,981 - between 65.2 percent
and 68.4 percent of the population.
Politically, the continued population shift to Clark
County will force state legislators to add more seats to
represent southern Nevada, giving the county an even
stronger voice in politics at the expense of the rest of the
state. Nevada also is in store for a third congressional
seat, and a piece of that district will probably be in Clark
County, which already makes up parts of the other two
seats.
Las Vegas’ population increased 85 percent to 478,434,
from 258,295 just 10 years ago.
Reno, the state’s second-largest city, grew by nearly
35 percent to 180,480 residents, and Carson City, the state
capital, grew about 30 percent to 52,457.
electricity than is being used, such as when no one is home
during the day, the solar energy is diverted into the local
power grid. When that happens, the home's electric meter
runs backward, creating free energy credits that the ho
meowner can use later.
However, if a home solar system generates more en
ergy than that household uses over the course of a year,
local utility companies are not obligated by law to buy
that excess power from the homeowner. So, it doesn’t
make sense for most homes to have systems with more
capacity than 5 kilAvatts.
For an extra $2,000 or so, solar system dealers offer a
set of solar-powered batteries to keep the electricity flow
ing in case of blackouts or a disaster-related outage.
Oklahoma-based Bergey WindpowerCo., which makes
residential wind turbines, sold 40 home units in Califor
nia in January, compared with just six in California in all
of 2000 and 12 in 1999.
“Sales are exploding,” said company President Michael
Bergey. “We see this as perhaps the launch of a new age
of affordable persona! power generation.”
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