Do you guys remember the good old days, when a Coca-Cola was just a Coca-Cola? When people who drank Pepsi, Coke and other soft drinks knew and accepted that they were just bottles of carbonated sugar water, and everyone was totally okay with it? That magic era when, if a person decided they wanted an extra-extra large soft drink to wash down their extra-extra large order fries and their quadruple cheeseburger with extra-extra cheese, all they had to do was Supersize that b*tch?
When men were men and America was great, God damn it!
Today, we live in a world that is slowly coming to grips with all the damage we've done to our arteries over the last few decades. We're realizing the health crises we've enveloped ourselves in, and we're trying desperately to make amends. A new day is upon us, and on this day, being healthy and taking care of your body is perceived as cool, and it's resulting in a lot of weird soda flavors.
On this day, companies like Coca-Cola and Pepsi are doing everything they can to stay relevant (and even legal) in a competitive market that's currently swaying away from those classic, sugary sweet delights.
Over the last few years, we've all seen the gimmicks - the Pepsi Clears and Green Tea Coca-Colas - and we've all probably made the same scrunched up faces at each one. Green Tea Coke? Are you f*cking bonkers? But not all of those campaigns are heinous. With the release of Coca-Cola's new Coca-Cola Plus I decided to have a look back on all the weird soda flavors released over the last few years to see which ones were effective, and which were better poured down the toilet:
Coca-Cola Plus
Coca-Cola
Coke is really trying to take this whole "stop giving people diabetes" thing seriously, which is why they're preparing for the release of Coca-Cola Plus. It's only debuting in the Japanese market to start, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, seeing as many brands in the food and beverage industry use Japan as a kind of sounding board to test the waters for new products.
Anyway, Coca-Cola Plus is allegedly supposed to be good for consumers. Not only does it come reinforced with added fiber, but it is also sugar and calorie-free. As if that wasn't enough, Coca-Cola is also claiming that if consumed daily, it'll help curb high cholesterol levels. I'll believe it when I see it, though.
Green Tea Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola
This Japanese market exclusive debuted in Japan in 2009 and received a mixed bag of reviews. Some said they really, really enjoyed it, while others... well, this woman describes the concoction as tasting like waste water. So, uh, there's that.
When asked about the motivation for the green tea soft drink, Coca-Cola Co. spokesman Katsuya Sato said it contained antioxidants and was geared toward women in their 20s and 30s who were health conscious and looking to improve their diet.
I don't know how exactly it worked out, but I'd be willing to bet some pretty serious money that no one lost weight or got healthier because of Green Tea Coke. Barf.
OK Soda
Tim Henson via Flickr
OK Soda was another soda drink from the brains at Coca-Cola. It was released in 1993 and marketed solely toward the Generation X crowd who, at the time, was preoccupied by grunge music, MTV and a dramatically unnecessary downward spiral of perpetual despair.
I'm convinced OK Soda was more of a proof-of-concept for new marketing tactics, as its limited release utilized "interesting" tactics like celebrity endorsements, edgy abstract art product design and some weird and blatantly negative PR campaigns. It failed in all of its 20-ish test markets, and was canned (ha!) just seven months after its launch.
Coca-Cola BlāK
doomkick.com
Someone from Coca-Cola must have seen The Drew Carey Show episode where he founds a beer company that mixes beer and coffee, because this is basically that, but with Coke.
Essentially, it was a Coke mixed with the essence of coffee, and for the two years it was out before it got discontinued, it was mostly well-received. First released in France in 2006, it was announced as a lower-calorie alternative to traditional coke (47 calories per 8-ounce glass vs. Coke Classic's 97 calories) and after initial success made its way to other markets, including the U.S., Canada, Czech Republic, Lithuanian, Poland and Slovenia.
Interesting note: the French and Canadian versions were sweetened only with sugar, while the U.S. f*cked it up like we always do with things like high fructose corn syrup, acesulfame potassium and aspartame.
Coca-Cola Life
Coca-Cola
Another attempt by Coke to take back some of the health-conscious beverage market, Coca-Cola Life is a lower calorie version of the original, but instead of high fructose corn syrup, it's sweetened by regular sugar and stevia, a no-calorie natural sweetener extracted from the Stevia rebaudiana plant.
Aside from its lower calorie count (60 percent less calories than Coke Classic), health nuts found it more acceptable than regular Diet Coke because it didn't include fake sweeteners like aspartame, which many believe are linked to a variety of health problems, including an increased risk of cancer.
Coca-Cola first introduced Coca-Cola Life in Argentina and Chile in 2013, and while they eventually removed them from those markets, they've found success in nearly 40 other countries, including Japan, the U.S., France, Italy, Germany and Estonia. And as we all know, if you can sell it in Estonia, you can sell it anywhere... or whatever.
Crystal Pepsi/Pepsi Clear
CNW Group PepsiCo Canada / Newscom
This one is a unique entry because despite being cancelled after its original release date in 1992, Crystal Pepsi was given an official re-release by Pepsi due to apparent consumer demand. Gauging its success is difficult because we're still waiting to see how it performs.
That said, PepsiCo. first released Crystal Pepsi in 1992 at the height of a worldwide marketing craze that essentially equated the idea of clear with purity. It was first released in Denver, Dallas, Sacramento and Providence. After performing well enough, PepsiCo. decided to give it a full release in 1993 under the clever-as-it-is-stupid tagline, "You've never seen a taste like this."
Despite selling well in its test markets, Crystal Pepsi did abysmally elsewhere and was taken off the shelves by early 1994.
After a massive social media campaign by The L.A. Beast in 2015, PepsiCo. announced they'd be resurrecting Crystal Pepsi as Pepsi Clear for limited release. After performing well in Canada and the U.S., as well as exclusively through a partnership with Amazon.com, Pepsi decided last November that they'd be re-releasing it in 2017 everywhere. So, we'll see.
Pepsi Blue
PepsiCo
You remember the commercials - the ones with the monks and that perfectly market researched rap-rock band, and the guy with the red hair drinking the bold blue liquid from the familiarly shaped bottle. That was Pepsi Blue. It was the most early millennium commercial ever, and while we all remember it, how did the thing it was representing turn out?
Eh, not well. Pepsi Blue, released by PepsiCo. in 2002 and vaguely described as a berry-flavored drink, was wiped from the shelves in 2004, probably because it was colored using the very controversial Blue 1 dye. Apparently, you can still find Pepsi Blue in Indonesia and the Philippines, but elsewhere proves highly, highly unlikely.
Pepsi Cappuccino
PepsiCo
Another one of those dream flavors I wish I could have tasted, PepsiCo. released Pepsi Cappuccino somewhere around 2006, but it's difficult to get an exact release date.
Apparently, it was only supposed to be a very limited release, but wound up making its way to Russia, Romania and other parts of Europe. Oddly, there're no real resources on the internet for this one.
Pepsi Raw
PepsiCo
One of PepsiCo.'s many cracks at healthier products, Pepsi Raw was released in 2008 to the UK market as a drink that used naturally-sourced ingredients, free from artificial flavors, colors and preservatives.
After two iffy years, Pepsi Raw was pulled from the shelves in the UK. It was also tested in the U.S. and Norway, where it underperformed and was never released on a wide scale. It's actually strange, because when Pepsi Raw was being run through market research tests - where almost 1.3 million bottles were distributed - 82 percent of consumers said they enjoyed the taste, and over 75 percent said they'd be willing to go out and buy it.
The only place where Pepsi Raw performed well enough for continued distribution was Australia, but even then, it may or may not be discontinued there.
Pepsi Ice Cucumber
Yamashita Yohei via Flickr
Nah, you're not reading that incorrectly. In the summer of 2007, PepsiCo. released a limited edition Pepsi Ice Cucumber. It was gross and had a nauseatingly pale green tint to it.
Apparently, the whole idea behind the release was to make people think of keeping cool during the hotter summer months. Turns out, all it did was make people think of throwing the fuck up. I mean, really... who does this stuff?!
Self-Freezing Coca-Cola
Self-Freezing coke is literally just Coca-Cola that's stored in a vending machine that keeps it just below freezing. No special additives, no secret sauce - just basic thermodynamics. But Highsnobiety be damned if our friends in Japan didn't go absolutely crazy over it.
First introduced back in 2010 as a promotional stunt, Self-Freezing Coke garnered enough attention and support to earn it a limited release last June on the islands of Shikoku and Tohoku. As of now, there are 1,000 machines in 7-Elevens across the two islands, and people are actually traveling from far and wide to check them out.
There were no preliminary stats available on the campaign's success (which shouldn't really shock anyone, seeing as how completely ordinary it is to see wild and wacky drink and food variations on display out there), but I imagine if the concoction keeps picking up speed, it won't belong before we start seeing machine sightings in Hong Kong and elsewhere.
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario