But in their place, Pepsi plans to introduce 1-liter bottles, halving the taxes that a distributor — and subsequently, the consumer — would need to pay per bottle. Philadelphia’s controversial soda tax has hurt Pepsi’s sales of larger-volume beverages by “more than 50 percent” within city limits, or as much as 40 percent overall (within Philly) when accounting for the sales of smaller bottles, reports Philly.com. Coca-Cola says that this strategy has actually proved effective well before Philadelphia’s soda tax took effect in Jan. 2017: Sales of the smaller beverages spiked by more than 9 percent in 2016 alone. PHILADELPHIA SOFT DRINK VENDORS SAY SODA TAX IS 'DEVASTATING' SALESOverall, soda sales are still fizzling out in Philadelphia, but Coca-Cola has yet to publicly announce any upcoming layoffs in the area. However, PepsiCo said they’d reinstate the workers if Philadelphia decides to repeal the measure, reports Vice.

Source: Fox News March 22, 2017 15:45 UTC