In 2004, a simple science experiment conducted by two fourteen-year-old Kiwi schoolgirls exposed false advertising claims made by the second largest food and drug company in the world. Yesterday, New Zealand courts fined that company more than $200,000 for fifteen breaches of its Fair Trading Act.
Made by GlaxoSmithKline, Ribena is a well-known juice drink outside of the US. One reason for its popularity? It has long claimed to be filled with wholesome, healthy vitamin C. In fact, advertisements for the product claimed the blackcurrants in Ribena syrup have "four times the vitamin C of oranges."
That was before Jenny Suo and Anna Devathasan decided to enter the Manukau Institute of Technology science fair. They expected their experiment--measuring the vitamin C content in a variety of juices--to be completely straightforward. They certainly didn't expect any surprises. As it turned out, they found that all the products they tested contained the advertised levels of the vitamin--except one. Multiple tests showed healthy, wholesome Ribena had ZERO vitamin C.
Since then, GlaxoSmithKline has admitted misleading the public. Odds are, they wouldn't have stopped if it hadn't been for two fourteen-year-old chemists.
4 comments:
It would be cool to find something cool about a well known product like that........... Hmmmmmmmmmm...
who is the new anonymous i thought we agreed we'd just put something in under "other" i(if you weren't a reader previous to her getting stuck in the french custums then you probably don't know what i'm takling about, just go to the " i meet my guide" post's comments t might take you a wile to get throught the 100+ comments but its there)
fun post, i'm really only commenting for the sake of commenting though...when are you going to get back to your french adventure, i'll keep reading no worries
It will start soon, theatre. And it will be worth it.
i've tasted ribena... not very good... too sweet!
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