For an entrepreneurial beverage company, getting to a million bottles might not be as glamorous as it sounds… just ask the founders of Hotlips Soda. The Portland, Ore.-based company, which has produced a line of premium fruit-based soft drinks since 2003, recently brewed its one millionth bottle of soda. Despite the milestone, David Yudkin and Jeana Edelman, the owners of Hotlips, aren’t celebrating.

Once an outspoken critic of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), Michael Pollan has clarified his views. In an article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the food writer now says that research on HFCS shows that the ingredient is no worse than sugar when it comes to the consumer diet. “I’ve done a lot to demonize [HFCS],” Pollan told the newspaper. “And people took away the message that there was something intrinsically wrong with it. A lot of research says that isn’t the case.”

Coca-Cola has agreed to acquire Great Plains Coca-Cola Bottling Co., the fifth-largest independent Coca-Cola bottler in the United States, for $360 million. The agreement follows Coke’s $12.3 billion acquisition of Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc., its largest bottler in North America, last year. The deal is expected to help Coke streamline operations and reduce its overall costs.

Could a symbol, such as a check mark, on the front of a can or bottle help consumers make healthier beverage decisions? The Institute of Medicine (IOM) thinks so. The organization recently released a government-sponsored report recommending that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) adopt a single, standardized front-of-package symbol system for all food and beverage packaging.