An ounce is costing them millions.
Soft-drink companies have spent huge sums retrofitting their assembly lines to accommodate Mayor Bloomberg’s new soda crackdown, according to industry insiders.
The law, which kicks in March 12, forbids hundreds of city eateries from selling soda in containers larger than 16 ounces.
Few drink makers in New York put beverages in that size bottle — and none is a soda. They include Snapple, Pom and Sunny Delight.
But the 16.9-ounce bottle is a popular size for Coke, Pepsi and other carbonated beverages.
Because those bottles are banned in eateries, many companies are changing to the slightly smaller packaging. But the change is going to cost plenty.
Coke and Sprite will soon come only in 16-ounce bottles at Domino’s Pizza so that soda can be delivered with take-out orders.
Other retailers are being told the same — that reduced-size sodas will replace popular options such as the one-liter and two-liter bottle.
“My delivery guy tells me they’ll bring 16 ounces,” said Lupe Balbuena of World Pie in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn
“We have to make capital investments to make a different size in order that retailers have a product within the guidelines,” an insider at a New Jersey bottling plant told The Post.
He added: “It’s kind of a silly point to say 16 ounces. There are products that are below that [size] that have a lot more calories.”
He mentioned beer and wine, but those and other alcoholic beverages aren’t included in Bloomberg’s new law.
Bottlers aren’t the only ones crying in their drinks over the new law.
Environmentalists and packaging experts worry that plastic waste will increase as a result.
They reason that since two-liter bottles will no longer be available from many restaurants, customers will choose to buy more bottles in a smaller sizes.
“Having four 16-ounce bottles with four caps and four labels is going to create more waste versus one two-liter bottle with one cap and one label,” said Elisabeth Cuneo, editor-in-chief of Food & Beverage Packaging magazine.