The country's top three soft-drink companies announced in May that beginning this fall they would start removing sweetened drinks like Coke and Pepsi from school cafeterias and vending machines in response to the growing threat of lawsuits and state legislation.
(Source; Marian Burros May 2, 2006 article, New York Times)

Soft Drink, Snacks and Water vending exceeded $35 billion in sales in 2005.
(Source; VT Census of the industry)

Sales of organic foods have grown 15 percent to 21 percent since at least 1997, according to the Organic Trade Organization. Last year, organic foods accounted for $13.8 billion in consumer sales. That's only 2.5 percent of total U.S. food sales, but up from 0.8 percent in 1997. Sales are expected to reach nearly $16 billion by the end of 2006.
(Source; Organic Trade Organization)

Sales of snack bars including Power, Balance and Clif Bar among others are forecast to exceed $3 billion annually in 2006.
(Source; report published by Market Research, a division of Packaged Facts)

Hansen’s Naturals healthy soft drink company has experienced 2,333% growth in their stock price in the last 5 years. The fastest growth of any company ever listed on the NASDAQ.
(Source; NASDAQ)

Whole Foods Market a leading grocer of natural/organic foods which owns and operates 173 stores has a market capitalization of $8 billion. By comparison Albertsons one of the largest grocery chains in the U.S. with over 1700 stores has a market capitalization of $9 billion.
(Source; NASDAQ)

Consumers are willing to pay a premium 25%, 50% even some times as high as 100% for natural/organic food and beverages.
(Source; Mintel/Coley Anderson FDA study)

Catering to the organic market suddenly is the rage of the nation's growth-starved food conglomerates. While sales at their traditional outlets -- supermarkets -- are growing barely more than 1% a year, sales at natural/organics foods retailers are rising at several times that rate.
(Source; Kevin Helleker article, Wall Street Journal)

Clif Bar sell over $100 million per year in healthy bars with their fastest growth segments in selling Luna bars designed especially for women and Z-bars designed for children.
(Source; Julie Schmidt; USA Today article)