Americans are drinking way less soda than they used to

American soda consumption has plunged.

In a recent research report to clients, an RBC Capital Markets team shared a chart showing just how dramatically soda consumption per capita in the US dropped over the last fifteen years.

"Since the late 1990s, per capita consumption of traditional carbonated soft drinks has declined in the US, from nearly 53 gallons per capita at its peak in 1998 to 41 gallons per capita in 2014," the analyst team wrote in the note.

"We note that the peak of soda consumption in the US aligns with the heightened awareness of the obesity crisis in the early 2000s (and the government's focus on sugary drinks,)" they added.

On the business side of things, this obviously poses a big problem for major soft drink retailers like Coca Cola. But Coke has recently started pushing other products such as carbonated water in an attempt to create a more diverse portfolio of beverages.

Here's RBC's chart. It's worth noting that the y-axis scale doesn't start at zero, so while the drop in soda consumption over the last 18 years has been dramatic, the chart somewhat visually exaggerates that decline:

RBC Capital Markets