” might find their sales suffering, not because their product tastes any worse, but because people would be satisfied with less of it at a time.”
Wrong. It does taste worse. Pepsi just did a run with “throwback Pepsi” made with sugar. I bought some thinking it would taste like the old Pepsi from my youth. It was NASTY.
Was it canned? Did it come in large multi-liter bottles? Both are inferior to sipping from the old glass bottles or even drinking from a glass or hard plastic drinking cup. Try looking for cans with the longest expiration date possible from a grocery, chill them well, and pour an entire can into a chilled glass cup, maybe over a little fresh ice. That will be closer to what you had as a youth. Even better, go mow your lawn in eighty-plus temperatures with your shirt off, come right inside, and drink the beverage in front of a fan set at high while your mom nags that it’s bad for your health.