GTP Alternative Cool Wall: 1985-1995 New Coke

1985-1995 New Coke

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  • Poll closed .
Roger the Horse

Roger the Horse

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Nominated by @JMoney

1985-1995 New Coke/Coke II


New_Coke_%28advertisement%29.jpg


-Created by Coca-Cola Marketing VP Sergio Zyman, Coca-Cola President Brian Dyson.
-Intended purpose was to sweeten the drink and outsell Pepsi in young markets.
-Initially saw overwhelmingly positive taste test results.
-Pepsi's response after New Coke was released was to have a nationwide day off from work and declare victory in America's soft drink rivalry.
-Was officially released on April 23rd, 1985. Production of the old formula ends less than two weeks after the announcement of the new formula.
-Over 400,000 letters were sent to Coke's headquarters in Atlanta expressing anger toward the new formula.
-Coke hired a psychiatrist to listen in on complaint calls. He told Coke executives that the callers sounded as if they had lost a family member.
-Fidel Castro's response to New Coke was to call it a sign of American capitalist decadence.
-Pepsi recorded the largest sales growth its company's history in the year following the release.
-One Texan spent $1,000 on the old Coke before it went defunct.
-The old formula, Coke Classic was reintroduced in July of 1985 following a sales slump, and eventually outsold both New Coke and Pepsi by the end of the year.
-New Coke was slowly withdrawn from shelves in the mid-90's.​








Sorry this is delayed. Easter, family, babies, inability to live in one country for more than a few months at a time, blah...
 
It was a shot at Pepsi that ended up failing miserably.

Seriously Uncool.
 
Remembering the wall in the kitchen of my childhood house where the Coke ended up on after trying the new formula equates to SU.
 
Marketing ploy to switch from real sugar to corn syrup. Seriously Uncool.

But as a connoisseur of colas, I've always wanted to try one.
 
Seriously uncool, I don't know who thought it was a good idea to change the recipe. If they had brought it alongside the original Coke, then I could accept that.
 
I've preferred Diet Coke from young age(11-ish?), but if I was going to buy a Coke, I need the Mexican Coke with sugarcane sugar. I don't really remember how new Coke tasted, but I remember it being OK(add fanboyism = cool).
Roger the Horse
-Pepsi's response after New Coke was released was to have a nationwide day off from work and declare victory in America's soft drink rivalry.​
Click to expand...
Cool story, Pepsi.
 
Liquid
Marketing ploy to switch from real sugar to corn syrup. Seriously Uncool.

But as a connoisseur of colas, I've always wanted to try one.
Click to expand...

Try a flat, but cold Pepsi. Done.

I remember having to wait three weeks to try it at a friend's house. Restaurants didn't have it, and by the time they had it about two months later, you couldn't get Classic for another two months.

Rumors or not, it's not much of a hard-and-fast lesson: some standards shouldn't be tinkered with, and other standards which refuse change are consigned to history. Basically, people "wanted change" but "not like that"...the public is fickle; all these taste-tests didn't really say much, but Coca-Cola freaked out. They should have treated it like car line-ups; see what works and what doesn't by offering them side-by-side.

I remember my grandparents buying a few 2-liters of Coke II when we visited one weekend, probably when I was 16 or so. It wasn't that bad, just different. There's always going to be folks that like one type of this food, or one type of that drink, and changing it is a bad idea. When it left, I'm sure only a few people actually missed it.

I'd be remiss without adding this ancient link.
 
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