360 Diet and Health
School District 11 was not as lucrative as it first seemed. The contract specified
annual sales quotas. School District 11 was obligated to sell at least 70,000 cases of
Coca-Cola products a year, within the first three years of the contract, or it would
face reduced payments by Coke. During the 1997–1998 school year, the district’s
elementary, middle and high schools sold only 21,000 cases of Coca-Cola prod-
ucts. Cara DeGette, the news editor of the Colorado Springs Independent, a weekly
newspaper, obtained a memorandum sent to school principals by John Bushey, a
District 11 administrator. On 28, September 1998, at the start of the new school
year, Bushey warned the principals that beverage sales were falling short of projec-
tions and that as a result school revenues might be affected. Allow students to
bring Coke products into the classrooms, he suggested; move Coke machines to
places where they would be accessible to students all day. ‘Research shows that
vendor purchases are closely linked to availability’, Bushey wrote. ‘Location, loca-
tion, location is the key.’ If the principals felt uncomfortable allowing kids to drink
Coca-Cola during class, he recommended letting them drink the fruit juices, teas
and bottled waters also sold in the Coke machines. At the end of the memo, John
Bushey signed his name and then identified himself as ‘the Coke dude’.
Bushey left Colorado Springs in 2000 and moved to Florida. He is now the
principal of the high school in Celebration, a planned community run by The
Celebration Company, a subsidiary of Disney.