sweeter Bolder better in 1985 Coca-Cola became New Coke changing its secret formula and unleashing a
public backlash here are 10 reasons why New Coke is the most controversial drink in the
world sounds controversial Brave New soda it's a brief New Coke the words New Coke still evoke
strong feelings among many Coca-Cola fans who wish the whole sordid Saga had been nothing but a bad
dream sadly it was all too real and it might have been the biggest self-inflicted public relations
blender committed by a major American company ever the executives at Coca-Cola were afraid
that Pepsi cola's clever attempts to Brand itself as the choice of the younger hip regeneration was
a serious threat to their profits this fear caused them to overcompensate and take the unprecedented
move of making a big deal out of changing Coke's vaunted secret formula to make matters worse they
changed it so it would be sweeter and taste more like well Pepsi the big idea over at Coca-Cola HQ
was basically to surrender to Pepsi and seemingly concede that their soda tasted better if all this
sounds a bit surreal to you then you're not alone fans of Coca-Cola didn't even wait to try new Coke
because this wasn't about taste so much as it was about belief in the brand if they wanted to drink
a cola that was like Pepsi they'd drink Pepsi how the people at Coca-Cola didn't see this coming
is a little perplexing and it's surprising that no one was fired for this blender it's
suppose it could happen to anyone bottlers of the World Unite assemble in the midst of the new Coke
Fiasco Coca-Cola was reminded just how important the bottlers really are it's because of the
bottling factories that customers can find their favorite Coca-Cola products on Supermarket shelves
Coca-Cola does not own or completely control the army of bottling plants that actually fill and
distribute the millions of bottles of cola that the company sells all around the world every year
the bottlers had quite a bit of Leverage over Coca-Cola back in the 1980s and many of them
exploited this fact when the negative customer reviews for new Coke started coming in a group
of disgruntled bottlers band together and went to Coca-Cola's headquarters in Atlanta to complain
about New Coke some of them were understandably perturbed that they found out about the switch
to New Coke not from Coca-Cola but on the radio the Coca-Cola bottlers Association entered The
Fray as well to strongly recommend that Coca-Cola reverse course and bring back the original form
Mila this pushback was a serious problem for the giant soda company because it needed the
cooperation of the bottlers to get its products on the shelves the bottlers played a role in the
new Coke Fiasco being reversed I'm not even sorry Cosby to the max because New Coke has
a better more modern taste than than before comedian Bill Cosby became an advertising
Pariah he was a sought-after pitch man in the 1980s and was well known for his Jello pudding
pop commercials at the time he also appeared in a number of Coca-Cola commercials touting
the soft drinks Superior taste when compared to its biggest rival Pepsi Pepsi's Cola was known
to be noticeably sweeter than Coke so when the advertisements for New Coke hyped the product's
new sweeter flavor Cosby objected at least in this case the comedian displayed Integrity by
quitting Coca-Cola he argued that he'd lost all credibility while touting New Coke a soda
that was much too similar to Pepsi this move made little sense to Cosby or to many of Koch's loyal
customers Pepsi was the Rival drink Coca-Cola had worked so hard to separate itself from but
then it decided to try to mimic it with the new formula Coca-Cola was left without a pitch man
but Cosby's exit presented the company with an opportunity to go in a new direction to fill the
void left by Cosby's exit Coca-Cola started using Max Headroom as its virtual pitchman
the creators talked up Headroom as a digital AI character but the reality for the smooth
shocking commentator was more mundane Max was actually played by an actor named Matt frewer
wearing Prosthetics and makeup Bill Cosby's exit and Max headroom's virtual smile are
one of the reasons why New Coke is the most controversial drink in the world if you're
not already a babbletop subscriber take a second and hit that subscribe button thanks how about a
new Coke to celebrate re-rebranding rebranding that just means admitting failure dad in 1985
Coca-Cola was selling the most popular Cola in the world when the comp company decided to shake
things up Coca-Cola changed the secret formula and rebranded its signature soda New Coke was created
to replace Coke but to put it mildly things didn't go as the company planned or at least hoped they
would an immediate backlash from customers and bottlers shook the company and it scrambled to
figure out how to do damage control even though New Coke sold well the negative reaction was too
big to ignore and Coca-Cola panicked after doing some soul searching the company decided to bring
back the iconic original formula but it wasn't called Coke anymore the original Coca-Cola was
rebranded Coke Classic and the company hoped the controversy was behind them New Coke became Coke
2 while Coke Classic remained Coke Classic in 2002 the company dropped the classic from the name and
returned to using the moniker of just Coke at the same time the company announced that coke 2 would
finally be discontinued by this time everyone was sick of all this nonsense and just went to drink
a familiar Coke oh you taste familiar respect your elders respect your Elda old Cola drinkers
of America was an actual group and its members had a few opinions about Coca-Cola's ill-fated
decision to replace their favorite beverage with new Coke however the ocda group wasn't satisfied
with this relatively innocuous tactic so they decided to take a more direct approach in the
great tradition of the Sons of Liberty who dumped a shipment of British tea into Boston Harbor the
Grassroots group poured bottles of offending soda into sewers you know a company has made a serious
error indeed when its customers are literally pouring its product down the drain one Coke
drinker went as far as filing a lawsuit to try to force Coca-Cola to sell its original formula
perhaps the plaintiff and other Coke drinkers found some relief when less than three months
later the company cried uncle and announced it was rushing the original formula to stores under
the name Coke class sec how much did the ocda influence Coca-Cola's decision to bring back the
original Coke it's difficult to know for sure but the Grassroots group made its voice heard and this
was before social media was around to amplify the message regardless the message came through loud
and clear that people were unhappy with new Coke and wanted the company to do something about it
besides audiences love happy endings Pepsi fizzled Pepsi would also be acceptable Coca-Cola's biggest
rival Pepsi tried to characterize its competitor switch to New Coke as a victory for its sweeter
taste in Cola Pepsi's marketing Ploy included an aggressive advertising campaign to brag that it
had won the so-called Cola Wars it was certainly entertaining even if it wasn't that effective in
the end the campaign boasted smug lines like now I know why Coke did it now I know why despite
Pepsi's entertaining commercials Coca-Cola was not in the bad shape that Pepsi wanted soda drinkers
to believe in fact sales of New Coke and Coke Classic were better than Pepsi sales in 1985.
Cherry Coke was also released that year and it also sold well it seems that some coke drinkers
who didn't warm up to New Coke chose to drink Cherry Coke as a stopgap measure only a few months
after New Coke hit shelves Coke Classic aka the original Coke was offered to customers even though
they could get their favorite Cola once again the whole thing left a bad taste in many people's
mouths some people were even getting a little paranoid wondering if Coke Classic really was the
original formula or if Coca-Cola was still playing games [Music] Coke tastes like Pepsi New Coke on
the market what about New Coke the Coca-Cola company is a successful business that has made
huge amounts of money selling soda to people all around the world as strange as it seems after
all the objections and recriminations that came later the people who ran Coca-Cola thought making
the cola sweeter and rebranding it as new Coke was a no-brainer with no downside even with the
controversy it turned out it was a good business decision because the company sales did rise after
New Coke was released however the gushing Fountain of bad publicity took Coca-Cola by surprise and
hurt the brand the soft drink company suffered a serious blow as new Coke became a case study
and how to create a public relations disaster however because it is a business the bottom line
is what ultimately matters the company could have introduced New Coke while keeping its original
Coke but this would have complicated its business Arrangements Coca-Cola decided that the best way
to hold on to its very profitable fountain drink market share was to stay with with one drink the
executives believed having both New Coke and the original Coke would not be palatable to the fast
food restaurants or to Coke lovers the decision to replace coke with new Coke ended up causing a lot
of consternation among Coca-Cola's customers who just wanted to keep drinking their favorite soda
I'm gonna go get a soda Pepsi challenged challenge accepted the largest soft drink
company on the planet changed the formula of its best-selling soda because it became paranoid about
its competitor Pepsi was Coca-Cola's cheap competition and the soft drink company came
up with a clever marketing campaign the company conducted blind taste tests pitting Pepsi against
Coke and then made commercials about the test because the results were favorable to Pepsi
this Pepsi challenge revealed that more Americans preferred the sweeter Taste of Pepsi to Coke Pepsi
convinced a certain number of Coca-Cola drinkers they should be part of the Pepsi generation and
these commercials awarded folks rival with a growing share of the Kula Market in the
1970s and 1980s much to Coca-Cola Chagrin its own taste tests came up with the same result as Pepsi
is dead this information set the soda Giant on a fateful course in 1985 New Coke debuted and the
company appeared to be completely oblivious to the notion that its loyal customers might object back
to having their favorite drink altered to taste more like the competitions Cola Coke Classic was
the company's attempt to remedy the mistake by reintroducing what a few months before was just
called Coke Pepsi had challenged Coca-Cola and the soda giant panicked causing itself and its
customers quite a bit of turmoil well anyone would be nervous with all the economic turmoil
you read about in that new diet coke you wanted diet coke diet coke debuted in 1982 to compete
with Diet Pepsi Coca-Cola felt and needed a direct competitor even though the company had
been selling the diet cola tab since 1963. Diet Pepsi was out selling tab so the time was right
for a true Diet Coke surprisingly tab was able to hang on for another 20 years after Diet Coke was
put on the supermarket shelves calorie-free Diet Coke with its distinct white and red can became a
popular alternative to Coke for people who wanted to cut their calories when cocoa decided it was
going to change the formula of its signature soda Diet Coke came in handy the new Coke formula was
actually a sweetened version of the formula for Diet Coke none of this made a lot of sense to
cook drinkers who seemed to be perfectly happy with Coke and diet coke and don't forget tab
Coca-Cola Executives never explained why its loyal customers should be happy with their favorite soda
being altered to taste more like the cola they don't drink at least they left Diet Coke alone
it's interesting that Diet Cokes formula was the starting point for new coke diet coke has
continued to sell well in its original form as far as we know and Coke became Coke again today
a bottle of coke has the words original taste printed in small letters on the label Keepers
and sugary even for my taste Coke Classic versus New Coke the damage control Coca-Cola had to deal
with was almost as silly as the original decision to change Coke to New Coke the CEO of the company
even appeared in a television commercial in a lame attempt to appease disgruntled customers he tried
to pass off the huge dust up the change had caused as a minor misunderstanding and insisted that the
new formula was an improvement and popular with consumers it's true that sales of New
Coke were strong but much of these sales could be attributed to the strong brand loyalty Coca-Cola
had enjoyed up to this point nevertheless the CEO and the other Coca-Cola Executives felt
it was necessary to bring back the original Coke formula under the name Coke Classic Coke Classic
was an admission that the original formula was still very much on the mines and taste buds of
coke Drinkers and that new Coke might have been an epic blender the company couldn't admit the
blender but it did move away from touting its new products flavor by comparing it with its
arch rival Pepsi by trying to please everyone it seemed like Coca-Cola pleased almost no one the
Speedy introduction of Coke Classic was seen as the company admitting they made a mistake the new
Coke versus Coke Classic tug of war is a reminder that the old adage if it isn't broke don't fix it
should be considered before making changes of this magnitude thirsty for more just tap or
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