Enviga was a carbonated canned green-tea drink. Enviga is a trademark of

Beverage Partners Worldwide Beverage Partners Worldwide was a joint venture between The Coca-Cola Company and Nestlé with headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland. The venture was originally started in 1991 but was dissolved in 1994 due to organizational and distribution disput ...

, a joint venture between

The Coca-Cola Company The Coca-Cola Company is an American multinational corporation founded in 1892. It manufactures, sells and markets soft drinks including Coca-Cola, other non-alcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups, and alcoholic beverages. Its stock is lis ...

and

Nestlé Nestlé S.A. ( ) is a Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate corporation headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland. It has been the largest publicly held food company in the world, measured by revenue and other metrics, since 20 ...

. It was available in three flavors:

Green Tea Green tea is a type of tea made from the leaves and buds of the '' Camellia sinensis'' that have not undergone the withering and oxidation process that creates oolong teas and black teas. Green tea originated in China in the late 1st millenn ...

, Tropical Pomegranate, and Mixed Berry. According to

Coca-Cola Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a cola soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. In 2013, Coke products were sold in over 200 countries and territories worldwide, with consumers drinking more than 1.8 billion company beverage servings ...

, Enviga burns 60 to 100

calorie The calorie is a unit of energy that originated from the caloric theory of heat. The large calorie, food calorie, dietary calorie, kilocalorie, or kilogram calorie is defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of one liter o ...

s per three 12-oz.(330 ml) cans due to its high EGCG and

caffeine Caffeine is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant of the methylxanthine chemical classification, class and is the most commonly consumed Psychoactive drug, psychoactive substance globally. It is mainly used for its eugeroic (wakefulness pr ...

content. The makers of the drink were sued for making fraudulent health claims about weight loss, and agreed to settle and cease repeating them. By 2008 the drink was practically removed from the market.

Nutritional facts

A can of Enviga has 5 calories, 100 mg of

, 35 mg of sodium, and 20% of the daily recommended calcium based on a 2,000 calorie diet. It is sweetened with

aspartame Aspartame is an artificial non-saccharide sweetener commonly used as a sugar substitute in foods and beverages. 200 times sweeter than sucrose, it is a methyl ester of the aspartic acid/phenylalanine dipeptide with brand names NutraSwe ...

and has no carbohydrates, fat, or protein.

Lawsuits over health claims

In February 2007, the watchdog group

Center for Science in the Public Interest The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) is a Washington, D.C.–based non-profit watchdog and consumer advocacy group. History and funding CSPI is a consumer advocacy organization. Its focus is nutrition and health, food safety ...

(CSPI) filed a lawsuit over company claims that Enviga acts as a calorie-burning and weight-loss product, as a " negative calorie" drink. The group claims that if Coca-Cola and Nestlé stop marketing the product as a calorie-burner, they would drop possible litigation. The beverage makers responded that they have deliberately avoided claims that Enviga is a weight-loss product, and that there exists independent research to substantiate the effects of the product. The watchdog group alleged that it was only a three-day study, and that it was only presented in a conference by the Obesity Society, the editors of journal ''

Obesity Obesity is a medical condition, considered by multiple organizations to be a disease, in which excess Adipose tissue, body fat has accumulated to such an extent that it can potentially have negative effects on health. People are classifi ...

'', where their conclusions were rejected. The lack of validity of the study was later referred to by the Attorney General in the settlement. Studies on the combination of caffeine and green tea anti-oxidant have given mixed results, and the results are not conclusive. The

State of Connecticut Connecticut ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York (state), New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. ...

also investigated the calorie-burning qualities of the drink. The

State Attorney General The state attorney general in each of the 50 U.S. states, of the District of Columbia, federal district, or of any of the Territories of the United States, territories is the chief legal advisor to the State governments of the United States, sta ...

Richard Blumenthal Richard Blumenthal ( ; born February 13, 1946) is an American politician, lawyer, and United States Marine Corps, Marine Corps veteran serving as the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States Senate, United States senator from ...

, demanded all scientific research associated with its calorie-burning qualities. In February 2009 the companies made a settlement with

Connecticut Attorney General The Connecticut attorney general is the state attorney general of Connecticut. The attorney general is elected to a four-year term. According to state statute, eligibility for the office requires being "an attorney at law of at least ten years' ...

, affecting several US states. They agreed to pay $650,000 to the states, remove any claims about weight loss, and add disclaimers that weight loss can only occur via diet and exercise. According to the US Federal News Service, the settlement requires that "any marketing of Enviga, or a similarly formulated beverage, that uses the terms 'the calorie burner,' 'negative calories,' 'drink negative,' or makes any claims explicitly or implicitly that consumers will burn calories by drinking Enviga, there must be a clear and conspicuous disclosure that the product does not produce weight loss without diet and exercise." (requires registration) In 2010, a US court of appeals did not allow a woman to sue Coca-Cola for weight-loss false advertising, and CSPI reported that it would not appeal the decision. CSPI said that the sales of Enviga had collapsed after its 2009 settlement, and that it had already met its goal of informing customers about the lack of efficacy of the beverage. CSPI announced that it was suing Coca-Cola again, but this time for its new beverage Vitaminwater.

Sales

As reported in the ''Sydney Morning Herald'', flavoured bottled water, sports drinks and teas, are increasing sales with the decline in sales of sugary soft drinks – with cold tea the fastest growing non-carbonated beverage category in the

U.S. The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguous ...

during the first half of 2006. Prior to launch, Coke had been trailing and losing market share in this sector to

Pepsi Pepsi is a Carbonated water, carbonated soft drink with a cola flavor, manufactured by PepsiCo which serves as its flagship product. In 2023, Pepsi was the second most valuable soft drink brand worldwide behind Coca-Cola; the two share a long ...

AriZona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

and

Snapple Snapple is a brand of tea and juice drinks which is owned by Keurig Dr Pepper, based in Plano, Texas, United States. The original producer of Snapple, a company that was known as Unadulterated Food Products, was founded in 1972. The brand achieved ...

Flavors

Discontinued: *Berry *Pomegranate *Peach Since the brand's inception, and the launch of the three original flavors, peach was the first to be dropped in favor of pomegranate as the third flavor.

References

External links