Diet Pepsi Stalwarts Give Thumbs Down To New Sucralose Formula

It’s been a month since PepsiCo’s newly reformulated Diet Pepsi – it’s sweetened with sucralose instead of aspartame – hit store shelves, and its performance so far suggests it’s not going to reverse plummeting industry-wide sales of diet sodas. PepsiCo’s CEO says it’s still too early to judge, but fans of the old formula have been using terms like “yuck” and “unpalatable” to express their aversion on social media. Initial consumer reaction to a change in an established product is often negative, the company says. PepsiCo has received only 3,000 complaints – it expected 9,000 – and nearly 370 positive responses.