Water is hot and diet soda is not.
U.S. sales of non-alcoholic beverages rose 2.2% in volume terms last year, the fastest growth rate since 2006, industry tracker Beverage Marketing Corp. reported on Thursday. Much of the upswing was fueled by bottled water, as health-conscious Americans increasingly grab nature’s drink.
U.S. bottled-water consumption totaled 10.87 billion gallons in 2014, up 7.3% from 2013, its fastest growth rate since 2006, according to Beverage Marketing. Soda consumption in the U.S., meanwhile, slid 1% to 12.76 billion gallons, the tenth straight yearly decline.
Beverage Digest, another industry tracker, on Thursday estimated U.S. per-capita consumption of carbonated soft drinks fell to its lowest level since 1986.
By 2017, the amount of bottled water consumed in the U.S. could surpass soda—long America’s go-to beverage, Beverage Marketing predicts.