Latest / Ridiculous History / The Bizarre Parable of New Coke, Chapter One: Sweeter, Stranger, Strange

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The Bizarre Parable of New Coke, Chapter One: Sweeter, Stranger, Strange · Ridiculous History

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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
0:27
Speaker 1: the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
0:31
Speaker 1: much for tuning in. Let's hear it for the man,
0:34
Speaker 1: the myth, the legend, our super producer, mister Max Williams,
0:38
Speaker 1: Who Max, Crystal Pepsi Williams and Crystal Gravy Williams. That's
0:44
Speaker 1: a snail shout out. That's mister Noel Brown. I am Ben,
0:52
Speaker 1: I'm Ben Bullet.
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Speaker 2: Yes, that's right, that is who you are. And I
0:56
Speaker 2: just have a question, man, is that a performative thing
0:59
Speaker 2: to people? Just are got they compelled to do it
1:01
Speaker 2: by habit? What is it indicating even refreshment satisfaction.
1:06
Speaker 1: I think it's nostalgia. I think it's also something people
1:11
Speaker 1: have been brainwashed into doing. But folks, if you like us,
1:14
Speaker 1: have spent a lot of time in the Southeast, you
1:17
Speaker 1: recognize that pop and that maybe there's some science to it,
1:23
Speaker 1: maybe aspirating like that makes the water a little spicier.
1:28
Speaker 1: A yeah, this is our story about something just patently ridiculous.
1:36
Speaker 1: And guys, are we soda fans? I don't think either
1:39
Speaker 1: of you guys are really.
1:41
Speaker 2: On the pop. I am a DDP man. Okay, it
1:45
Speaker 2: means diet doctor Pepper. Oh, okay, I think it is
1:48
Speaker 2: the superior diet soda. I used to be a DC man,
1:52
Speaker 2: but now I'm exclusively a DDP man. And other than that,
1:55
Speaker 2: only a fizzy water. And lately I've been making pomegranate
1:58
Speaker 2: fizzy water spritzers, which is kind of like a soda
2:00
Speaker 2: that you make at home. Hmmm. Nice. What about you, Max? Uh?
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Speaker 3: Personally A, I love that you drop the pop reference
2:08
Speaker 3: right there. Of course, as a native Midwesterner, the word
2:12
Speaker 3: pop is just burned into my memory. But it has
2:16
Speaker 3: been many years since I've had a soda pop. Whoa, Yeah,
2:20
Speaker 3: well a Coca Cola and most soda pops are not
2:23
Speaker 3: conditioned there. But also I before that it would be
2:28
Speaker 3: it was a very rare occasion. I just I know,
2:30
Speaker 3: I like soda when I was younger, but I don't know.
2:32
Speaker 3: I around my mid twenties, I just stopped drinking it.
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Speaker 2: Well, it is bonkers to me that some people just
2:39
Speaker 2: drink it as they're like only of fluid. Yeah, it's
2:44
Speaker 2: the source of hydration.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a special occasion for me, guys.
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Speaker 2: I'm a whole street Coca cola zero.
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Speaker 1: Uh, I don't know if I could take the unletted
2:54
Speaker 1: here in my ancient years.
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Speaker 2: You know, when I'll have the unletted occasionally been and
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Speaker 2: only then is on an airplane, will I will get
3:02
Speaker 2: a full flavored coke because they don't give you the
3:04
Speaker 2: whole can and it's with ice. So it's just sort
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Speaker 2: of like, oh, what was that like? Let me remind
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Speaker 2: myself what that tastes like?
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Speaker 1: And it is the taste of a generation, and it
3:14
Speaker 1: will taste different on a plane due to the high altitude. Yeah,
3:20
Speaker 1: maybe we know that soda is not for everyone, and
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Speaker 1: we are not going to pretend it's the most healthy
3:27
Speaker 1: thing you can drink. But hot dog, folks, is it tasty?
3:31
Speaker 1: You can find all sorts of spins on the basic ingredients, right, sugar,
3:35
Speaker 1: flavored syrup, carbonated water, a little bit of acid.
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Speaker 2: Some sodas like it makes it really kick, really kicks.
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Speaker 1: Some sodas like Coca cola, pepsi, you know, you know
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Speaker 1: them all the world round, and then others are more
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Speaker 1: regionally famous, like have you guys ever tried a cheer
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Speaker 1: wine or.
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Speaker 2: Doctor enough, Doctor enough? It's just enough. Ben, I think
4:01
Speaker 2: I mentioned to you the other day that I've been
4:03
Speaker 2: really enjoying rewatching and watching some of it for the
4:06
Speaker 2: first time. A sketch comedy show called The Birthday Boys,
4:09
Speaker 2: and they did a fantastic sketch where there's that old
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Speaker 2: trope of like, you know, the two guys that know
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Speaker 2: the secret recipe to coca cola never allowed to like
4:20
Speaker 2: fly on the same plane together or even like you know,
4:23
Speaker 2: I guess the lore the exaggerated version goes be in
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Speaker 2: the same room together. Well, in this Birthday Boys sketch,
4:28
Speaker 2: they're best friends and they're one of them is like
4:30
Speaker 2: on an interview show and he's asking him about so
4:32
Speaker 2: what's the deal with the whole like you and the
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Speaker 2: other guys. Oh, he's right over there. We drove here together.
4:38
Speaker 2: We're gonna go to a movie later, you want to come,
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Speaker 2: And then the guys that know the pepsi recipe are
4:43
Speaker 2: also there. And then later on the two guys that
4:46
Speaker 2: know the tab recipe saunter in and nobody cares about
4:49
Speaker 2: what happens to them.
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Speaker 1: Oh my gosh. The only person I knew who an
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Speaker 1: ironically drank tab was our old mentor and original boss,
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Speaker 1: Roxanne Reed. She actually liked it. I thought it was
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Speaker 1: a bit for years.
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Speaker 2: I don't understand what tab is. I think it's basically
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Speaker 2: just like generic diet cola that doesn't taste like anything
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Speaker 2: in particular. But I can't really speak to it, Ben,
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Speaker 2: because I've never I've never had the pleasure.
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Speaker 1: It's I've had the unfortunate experience. It answers the question
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Speaker 1: I guess some customers have where they're drinking a different
5:24
Speaker 1: soda and they say, what if this tasted terrible?
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Speaker 2: Right? What if it was this but bad?
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Speaker 1: Kind of like Dr pepper twenty three secret ingredients and
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Speaker 1: they're all poop.
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Speaker 2: Now, Ben, you know, I'm a Doctor pepper Man, although
5:36
Speaker 2: I'm really more of a of a DDP man, but
5:38
Speaker 2: I will occasionally have a full flavor one of those
5:41
Speaker 2: as a treat as well. But Ben, you know who
5:44
Speaker 2: did take something that everybody loved and thought what if
5:47
Speaker 2: it was this but bad? Well? It was the Coca
5:50
Speaker 2: Cola company, That's right. Yes, episode's all about that is
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Speaker 2: and I think that's what they were doing. They thought
5:56
Speaker 2: they were being real crafty and smart, and they were
5:59
Speaker 2: telling them the public a new idea that this is gonna,
6:02
Speaker 2: you know, take take coke into the future. And of course,
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Speaker 2: as we sit and record this, and as we sit
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Speaker 2: in most days of our lives, we find ourselves in
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Speaker 2: the fair metropolis that is Atlanta, Georgia, home of the
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Speaker 2: Atlanta Braves, chicken wings, and coc colon.
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Speaker 1: And you've probably heard countless stories from the Great Soda Wars,
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Speaker 1: like how companies work to keep their recipe secret, or
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Speaker 1: how this is a true story, folks, PEPSI was briefly
6:36
Speaker 1: a naval force, But today we're looking at something different.
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Speaker 1: This spicy little sip or ridiculous history is coming to
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Speaker 1: us from none other than, as you said, NOL, Atlanta's
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Speaker 1: own Coca Cola. We can all agree Coke is a
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Speaker 1: massive success story, but we can also agree they did
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Speaker 1: not get everything right. So grab your favorite ashy snack
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Speaker 1: of choice. What goes better with a soda? We leave
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Speaker 1: it to you. This may be a two parter, or
7:07
Speaker 1: dare we say a two leader. Perhaps the best example
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Speaker 1: of a swing and a miss by our friends at
7:14
Speaker 1: Coke is something called New Coke. New Coke, and stay
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Speaker 1: tuned for some conspiracies at the end.
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Speaker 2: Nol, we've talked about this fella recently. Ben, When does
7:26
Speaker 2: this come up in recent episodees talking about John as Pemberton,
7:29
Speaker 2: the pharmacist.
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Speaker 1: With oh gosh, yeah, we have talked about him in
7:34
Speaker 1: the past. I think it's.
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Speaker 2: Recently and I can't remember what it was.
7:39
Speaker 1: It's weird because we have, you know, we have a
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Speaker 1: bit of a bubble of information, folks, Max Noll and yours. Truly,
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Speaker 1: We're going to keep the origin story short, partially because
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Speaker 1: it could be it's an old episode, partially because, as
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Speaker 1: you pointed out, Nol, we probably end up talking about
7:56
Speaker 1: this pretty often, but mainly because, folks, everybody who grew
8:01
Speaker 1: up in Georgia already knows the origin story of Coca cola,
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Speaker 1: chapter and verse. Yeah, take us to Pemberton.
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Speaker 2: Man, Well, I did kind of forget that. Johnny p
8:12
Speaker 2: not to be confused with Johnny Pemberton, who's a delightful
8:15
Speaker 2: comedian and actor, was actually a colonel in the Civil
8:19
Speaker 2: War for the Batties.
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Speaker 1: A Confederate colonel, he had sustained some pretty gnarly injuries,
8:28
Speaker 1: and this led to him picking up an equally gnarly
8:31
Speaker 1: morphine addiction.
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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, a monkey on his back. After the war,
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Speaker 2: he desperately searched for something to kick the habit. With yeah,
8:43
Speaker 2: and it was the right thing to do.
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Speaker 1: This is the mid eighteen eighties. He is based in
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Speaker 1: Columbus at the time, and he originally comes up with
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Speaker 1: something he calls Pemberton's French Wine coca.
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Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, so cocaine juice, yes, with alcohol and caffeine.
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Speaker 2: Let's replace my morphine addiction with alcoholism and cocaine addiction.
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Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, And the issue was Pemberton's French Wine coca.
9:11
Speaker 1: It's sold, okay, I know, but also French wine feels
9:16
Speaker 1: it's weird to say both of those.
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Speaker 2: It's a little redundant a bit.
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Speaker 1: And this this concoction wasn't quite scratching the itch for him,
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Speaker 1: if you get what we're saying.
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Speaker 2: So now he's French invented wine. It just seems like
9:30
Speaker 2: putting a hat on a hat.
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Speaker 1: It does, Yeah, because when Americans think of wine, they
9:34
Speaker 1: already think of France, you know what I mean. Nobody's
9:37
Speaker 1: like wine, oh, Spanish, even though there are lots of
9:41
Speaker 1: Spanish wines.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, and some people might think of Italy, but I
9:44
Speaker 2: certainly think of France.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, right, I'm right there with you, man. So it's
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Speaker 1: eighteen eighty six Atlanta and the larger Fulton County passed
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Speaker 1: prohibition laws because they hated fun and so in response,
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Speaker 1: our buddy Johnny makes a non alcoholic version of Pemberton's
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Speaker 1: French Wine. He does up the cocaine quotient, right, He
10:07
Speaker 1: calls it well, his bookkeeper tells him to call it
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Speaker 1: coca cola. That's the basic story. And yes, as you
10:15
Speaker 1: can tell, folks, we are familiar with the rumors. They
10:18
Speaker 1: are true. Up until about nineteen oh three, the original
10:24
Speaker 1: Coca Cola, Coca Cola Classic as it would later be called,
10:28
Speaker 1: did contain cocaine. Like we say, it was a different time.
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Speaker 2: And actually again this must have come up on her stuff.
10:35
Speaker 2: They don't want you to know. But to this day,
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Speaker 2: the cocaine that would be a byproduct of the coca
10:43
Speaker 2: that's used to make Coca cola like goes somewhere. It
10:46
Speaker 2: does exist, and they generate a ton of the stuff
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Speaker 2: every single year.
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Speaker 3: To jump in here, a great minds thingle light like
10:55
Speaker 3: also nol in my mind thinks like as well as
10:58
Speaker 3: I was about to jump in here and ask that
10:59
Speaker 3: exact same question, because I was talking to a doctor
11:02
Speaker 3: friend of mine and I'm not to get the nose
11:03
Speaker 3: procedure done. She's like, Oh, yeah, they're gonn numbing up.
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Speaker 3: I'm like, probably with a bunch of a cocaine from
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Speaker 3: Coca cola.
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Speaker 2: That's what it is. It goes to the dental Yes,
11:13
Speaker 2: it goes to malancrot pharmaceuticals. The cocaine byproduct extracted from
11:18
Speaker 2: coca leaves used to flavor coca cola is sold to
11:20
Speaker 2: a pharmaceutical company and often used in various topical forms.
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Speaker 1: Because of the numbing effect, I believe. So there is
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Speaker 1: so much more to the history of Coca cola. That's
11:31
Speaker 1: a That's a drink for another day. For now, let's
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Speaker 1: fast forward skirt skirt across Coke's expansion throughout the US
11:39
Speaker 1: and then later across the planet. At the close of
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Speaker 1: World War Two, Coca Cola controls something like sixty percent
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Speaker 1: of the entire market share for cola. This is a
11:50
Speaker 1: catbird seat. But we all know the problem with being
11:53
Speaker 1: the king of the hill. Kings have a tendency to fall.
11:57
Speaker 2: That's true, and if you take a shot at the king,
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Speaker 2: you're best not messed. That doesn't really apply here, but
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Speaker 2: it's an expression that I enjoy.
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Speaker 1: Yes, ed, we know that Coke already by this point
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Speaker 1: has an arch rival, Pepsi.
12:13
Speaker 2: Ah.
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Speaker 1: Pepsi is hot on Coca Cola's heels. For a time
12:18
Speaker 1: it looked as though Pepsi might win the soda wars.
12:21
Speaker 1: It's if you look at nineteen eighty three, you see
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Speaker 1: the Coke's market share, which again used to be sixty percent,
12:28
Speaker 1: has decreased by more than half, all the way down
12:31
Speaker 1: to under twenty four percent. And the issue here is
12:34
Speaker 1: that Pepsi is out selling Coke in grocery stores and markets.
12:40
Speaker 1: Coke is barely hanging on because they have all these
12:44
Speaker 1: legacy deals with big institutions. They have armies of vending machines,
12:49
Speaker 1: they have an exclusivity agreement with the fast food giant McDonald's,
12:55
Speaker 1: so that's where they're making their money.
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Speaker 2: For sure, and that's obviously still very much a thing today.
13:02
Speaker 2: I am always bummed out when I go to a
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Speaker 2: place and realize they only sell Pepsi products, because I
13:06
Speaker 2: just think pepsi is gross. I do not like the
13:08
Speaker 2: way it tastes, and again not a soda drinker, but
13:11
Speaker 2: I just think it's not a local bias. Coke just
13:13
Speaker 2: unequivocally tastes better than pepsi. So Coke did respond to this,
13:18
Speaker 2: you know, potential catastrophe of you know, pepsi just eating
13:22
Speaker 2: up all their market share in multiple ways. Their marketing
13:26
Speaker 2: folks believe that these aging baby boomers would become increasingly
13:32
Speaker 2: likely to drink diet sodas or you know, maybe like
13:34
Speaker 2: switched to water as they became more health and weight
13:39
Speaker 2: conscious over time. So any growth and what they in
13:43
Speaker 2: the industry refers to as full calorie sodas would have
13:46
Speaker 2: to come from younger customers, you know, buying things like
13:49
Speaker 2: Surge and Josta. H. Yeah, remember those, they said those
13:54
Speaker 2: in schools.
13:55
Speaker 3: M h.
13:56
Speaker 1: I'm a fan of Jolt as well, and the Serge
13:59
Speaker 1: people gave me and my cohort a bunch of Surge
14:04
Speaker 1: themed CDs.
14:06
Speaker 2: Back in the day.
14:06
Speaker 1: I think I still have one. But anyhow, what what
14:10
Speaker 1: we know is that they were they were onto something,
14:13
Speaker 1: because these young customers are always going to be the
14:17
Speaker 1: golden goose for marketing, and it seems these kids who
14:22
Speaker 1: maybe liked the higher sugar sweetness content they dug pepsi.
14:27
Speaker 1: And there's also a cultural thing that occurs because coke
14:31
Speaker 1: is seen by part of this younger demographic as a
14:35
Speaker 1: member of the stodgy status quo and Pepsi, in contrast,
14:39
Speaker 1: is a little more exciting, a little bit more edgy.
14:42
Speaker 1: So the folks at Coca Cola started asking themselves, how
14:46
Speaker 1: do we make coke cool?
14:48
Speaker 2: Again?
14:48
Speaker 1: Very important question, but the co came back right right,
14:52
Speaker 1: and someone said, uh, Jeremy, you're.
14:55
Speaker 2: Crazy, Sorry about that. We're gonna need to do this
14:59
Speaker 2: my way.
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Speaker 1: At the same time, you know, this question becomes a
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Speaker 1: time sensitive question. It's no longer abstract because they can
15:11
Speaker 1: see that across the board customers are purchasing less cola.
15:17
Speaker 1: In general, the market is as you mentioned there, nol,
15:20
Speaker 1: it's shifting to diet drinks and non soda soft drinks,
15:24
Speaker 1: and Coke does manufacture and sell quite a lot of
15:28
Speaker 1: those alternative beverages. But they still felt the writing was
15:33
Speaker 1: on the wall. Harumph, hrrumph. Something had to be done.
15:44
Speaker 2: Well, and they weren't going to just let their flagship
15:47
Speaker 2: legacy cash cow brand recognition beverage slip away. Oh yeah,
15:53
Speaker 2: absolutely not, because it's still a Leviathan, right, And it's
15:57
Speaker 2: not just a twelve ounce can or a bottle or
16:01
Speaker 2: a six and a half ounce bottle. At this point,
16:04
Speaker 2: it is a. It is a piece of identity, a
16:08
Speaker 2: nostalgia for a lot of people. So into the scene
16:13
Speaker 2: strolls one of those move fast and break things kind
16:17
Speaker 2: of guys, a new CEO with the name of Roberto Goizueta, Gitsueta,
16:24
Speaker 2: who truly takes on this attitude that nothing is sacred,
16:30
Speaker 2: not even the holiest of holy, the you know, original
16:33
Speaker 2: recipe Coca cola. This happens in nineteen eighty.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, and he says, look this, he first gets the
16:41
Speaker 1: position in nineteen eighty, right, and he is, like you said,
16:45
Speaker 1: he's kind of a cowboy, right, and he's a coke
16:48
Speaker 1: man for sure. He had previously worked in the Bahamas
16:52
Speaker 1: for the Coke subsidiary there, which will come into play.
16:56
Speaker 1: They decided to create their own version of skunk Works.
17:01
Speaker 1: Skunk Works is famously here in the US. It is
17:05
Speaker 1: the secret arm of Lockheed Martin that works on you know,
17:10
Speaker 1: the spy planes.
17:11
Speaker 2: And the real spooky stuff. Yeah, I'm sort of a
17:13
Speaker 2: military Willy Wonka kind of situation exactly.
17:16
Speaker 1: That's a great way to put it. So Coke is
17:18
Speaker 1: making their own kind of skunk Works, and the ZX,
17:22
Speaker 1: which is I think a pretty cool term for executives
17:25
Speaker 1: what do we think? Okay, the X All right, So
17:29
Speaker 1: the ZX go to their marketing VP at the time,
17:32
Speaker 1: a guy named Sergio Zimon, and their USA Coca Cola president,
17:37
Speaker 1: a guy named Brian Dyson, and they say, all right,
17:41
Speaker 1: we're gonna have a top secret operation. We are going
17:44
Speaker 1: to mess with the original formula and no one can know.
17:47
Speaker 1: So we have to call it a code name, and
17:50
Speaker 1: we're going to call it Project Kansas.
17:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, not to be confused with the Florida Project. There's
17:57
Speaker 2: no reason you would confuse it. I just think it's
17:59
Speaker 2: funny when these big covert things are named in such
18:03
Speaker 2: dull and uninteresting ways.
18:05
Speaker 1: And what was the Florida Project? Again?
18:07
Speaker 2: Was that Disney Disney? Yeah, it was the way it
18:09
Speaker 2: was like, it was the code name used so that
18:12
Speaker 2: no one would know that the Walt Disney Corporation was
18:14
Speaker 2: secretly buying up all this land on the cheap.
18:18
Speaker 1: In the Reedy Creek district.
18:19
Speaker 2: That's right.
18:20
Speaker 1: We have an episode about that too on stuff They'll
18:22
Speaker 1: let you know.
18:23
Speaker 2: Also the name of excellent film about folks living in
18:27
Speaker 2: some of the low rent, kind of disney fied motels
18:31
Speaker 2: on the outskirts of Disneyland there in Florida in Orlando.
18:35
Speaker 2: The filmmaker that did that went on to win an
18:38
Speaker 2: Oscar for Anora. It's one of his early early ones.
18:42
Speaker 2: And I think it's phenomenal awesome.
18:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Project Kansas you might be seeing. Hey, guys,
18:48
Speaker 1: you made such a big deal about Coca Cola being
18:51
Speaker 1: a cultural institution in Atlanta. Why is this called Project Kansas? Well, folks,
18:57
Speaker 1: it is named after an internally famous photo of a
19:01
Speaker 1: journalist named William Allen White. In the photo, he is
19:05
Speaker 1: just looking housing a Coca Cola. We're kidding. He's sipping
19:09
Speaker 1: it through a straw like a little punk.
19:11
Speaker 2: But he does look like a dainty fellow with his
19:14
Speaker 2: with his bowler hat on, standing at the soda fountain,
19:17
Speaker 2: just sipping away, clutching the glass, the tiny glass, and
19:20
Speaker 2: he's clutching the glass and the straw and just seems
19:23
Speaker 2: like he's having a good old time. Oh I like
19:25
Speaker 2: this pever sure.
19:30
Speaker 1: Carbonated stuff through a straw. Anyway, It's unusual, man, it's unusual.
19:36
Speaker 2: Yeah.
19:36
Speaker 1: Well yeah, if it's got ice, yeah, that changes.
19:42
Speaker 3: He's also a small cup like cup I'm looking at nice.
19:46
Speaker 2: I think that was back when they mixed it on
19:47
Speaker 2: the and yeah, on the fly, and yeah, the soda
19:51
Speaker 2: jerks and I think they did use sort of smaller
19:53
Speaker 2: cups back in those.
19:54
Speaker 3: And there's a guy in the background who's just drinking
19:55
Speaker 3: it without a straw straight.
19:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, like a couple of it looked like a bunch
19:59
Speaker 2: of gangsters, so like they're about to do a heist. Actually,
20:03
Speaker 2: everyone accept our man in the front. He just looks
20:05
Speaker 2: like an old man that wandered onto the scene. And
20:08
Speaker 2: then these g men are in the back and joining
20:10
Speaker 2: their sodas a little more, you know, covertly.
20:13
Speaker 1: And this photo please do look it up if you
20:16
Speaker 1: if you get a second again. That journalist is named
20:19
Speaker 1: William Allen White. Kansas journalists Koch loved this photograph. They
20:24
Speaker 1: had used it in all sorts of marketing campaigns, and
20:27
Speaker 1: if you walked around the zech's offices, you would see
20:30
Speaker 1: that several of them had prints of this photo, large
20:34
Speaker 1: prints that they would hang up on their office walls.
20:37
Speaker 1: So that's why they called it the Kansas Project. Sergio
20:41
Speaker 1: and Brian are looking back at the data they have
20:46
Speaker 1: from numerous blind taste tests, surveys and focus groups, and
20:52
Speaker 1: they emphasized the taste test because most of the taste
20:56
Speaker 1: tests tell them that when customers go don't know which
21:01
Speaker 1: pop or soda they're drinking, they tend to prefer pepsi
21:05
Speaker 1: because it has a sweeter taste.
21:07
Speaker 2: Boers to me, Man, Bogers, I mean, it's like coke
21:12
Speaker 2: has a flavor. Pepsi just kind of tastes like overly
21:16
Speaker 2: saccharine syrup water.
21:19
Speaker 1: Do you guys think that people drink because I know
21:23
Speaker 1: a lot of people order it a bar, like a
21:25
Speaker 1: whiskey and a coke or a jack and coke or something.
21:28
Speaker 1: Do people do that with pepsi?
21:30
Speaker 3: Yes, they very much do. Like I have, like you know,
21:33
Speaker 3: I still have like family back in like Michigan and
21:35
Speaker 3: stuff like that, and they'll talk about like, oh yeah,
21:37
Speaker 3: when the bar and got a jack and pepsi. I'm like,
21:39
Speaker 3: oh what, And it actually sounds like foreign to you.
21:42
Speaker 3: It's like what is this? What is this cocktaiin I've
21:44
Speaker 3: never heard.
21:44
Speaker 2: Of it, much like restaurants would. In particular, bars tend
21:48
Speaker 2: to have a coke or pepsi not.
21:50
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, at least in my experience in Atlanta, we
21:53
Speaker 3: basically get all your soda boxes from a specific distributor,
21:59
Speaker 3: so you get like all and they usually will have
22:01
Speaker 3: coke that stripul will either have coke or pepsi or
22:04
Speaker 3: something other things. So yeah, that's how it's exactly the
22:07
Speaker 3: same as it would be able to change. So, like
22:08
Speaker 3: you know, I think was a KFCs pepsi products, but
22:10
Speaker 3: that's r mc donald's, yeah.
22:12
Speaker 2: Because they're part of young brands Taco Bell as well.
22:15
Speaker 2: And while I can't I can't stand pepsi, I do
22:18
Speaker 2: love a Baja.
22:19
Speaker 3: Blast, But in Atlanta, you know, it's just such a
22:22
Speaker 3: coke area that like everything is like it's like I
22:25
Speaker 3: remember being like we were just talking about one time
22:27
Speaker 3: just in general, and it was like massively more expensive
22:30
Speaker 3: and even just do pepsi.
22:33
Speaker 2: Pepsi's kind of king yes still and in the Midwest
22:36
Speaker 2: and in the Pacific Northwest, and yeah, you're what you're
22:41
Speaker 2: saying there.
22:41
Speaker 1: Max ties into this idea of monopolization of distribution channels,
22:47
Speaker 1: which is another part of coke's success, to be quite honest,
22:50
Speaker 1: as well as pepsi's. And this marketing is confusing to
22:55
Speaker 1: Sergio and Brian because, as we mentioned earlier, they already
22:59
Speaker 1: had other research that told them that a lot of
23:03
Speaker 1: people were shifting away from the calorie heavy, super sweet stuff.
23:07
Speaker 1: So why do these blind taste tests seem to emphasize
23:12
Speaker 1: really sweet things. It might be because the first sweet
23:15
Speaker 1: sip is cool, but it doesn't mean you would want
23:18
Speaker 1: one hundred other SIPs of equal sweetness. Still, the facts
23:22
Speaker 1: are the facts. So these guys went back and they
23:25
Speaker 1: fused with the Holy Grail, the secret formula for Coca Cola.
23:31
Speaker 1: They mainly made it sweeter, logical move, and then they
23:35
Speaker 1: put that secret still very sweet soda into fresh rounds
23:40
Speaker 1: of taste tests. So now you would have like three cups.
23:43
Speaker 1: You would have a little cup of unidentified pepsi, a
23:46
Speaker 1: little cup of secret Coca Cola, and a little cup
23:49
Speaker 1: of what they were not yet calling new coke. And
23:53
Speaker 1: this gets really interesting because they do some of these
23:58
Speaker 1: taste tests in the Southeast United States, the historic cultural
24:02
Speaker 1: stronghold of Coca Cola, and the customers there seem to
24:07
Speaker 1: prefer the new flavor. And then once somebody unveils the
24:12
Speaker 1: results and says, hey, this is also a Coca Cola product,
24:16
Speaker 1: the brand loyalty kicks in. Guys, the brainwashing kicks in,
24:19
Speaker 1: and they say.
24:20
Speaker 2: Oh, this is coke.
24:21
Speaker 1: Well, I love coke, so I love this too.
24:24
Speaker 2: For sure, And so they're hoping anyway. I mean, you know,
24:27
Speaker 2: because it is there's a certain amount of nostalgia at
24:30
Speaker 2: play in a brand like that that has such historical
24:34
Speaker 2: roots and all of the imagery and gets credited for
24:37
Speaker 2: being like responsible for the modern version of Santa Claus
24:41
Speaker 2: and you know, all of these things that are kind
24:43
Speaker 2: of wrapped up in American culture, and this guy kind
24:48
Speaker 2: of overplaces hand a bit and thinking that that stuff's
24:51
Speaker 2: going to be the stuff that's going to earn them
24:54
Speaker 2: some good will. But in fact, what he's done here
24:58
Speaker 2: is kind of took a big old poop on all
25:00
Speaker 2: that stuff.
25:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there's a true story. In the taste test,
25:12
Speaker 1: this stuff was so popular that one of their bottling
25:17
Speaker 1: companies liked it so much they threatened to sue Coca
25:21
Speaker 1: Cola if the company didn't actually roll out the product.
25:25
Speaker 1: And to explain this really quickly, because Coca Cola is
25:29
Speaker 1: such a big company, a lot of us regular consumers
25:33
Speaker 1: Johnny Blue Jeans on the street, we're not aware that
25:36
Speaker 1: the bottling companies are going to be third parties. Pretty
25:40
Speaker 1: often they have a contract with Coca Cola proper, but
25:44
Speaker 1: they're their own thing and they just happened to have
25:47
Speaker 1: a deal that allows them to make coke products.
25:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, and as we also know or maybe you don't,
25:53
Speaker 2: when it comes to these types of companies, you got
25:56
Speaker 2: to like make these orders way in advance in order
25:59
Speaker 2: to make uh deadlines for product rolls rollouts, and it's
26:03
Speaker 2: it's it's a it's a whole thing where you sometimes
26:05
Speaker 2: have to schedule these productions like year a year in
26:07
Speaker 2: demand sometimes. So it would absolutely be a problem if
26:13
Speaker 2: all of a sudden they didn't have that business because
26:15
Speaker 2: they've literally, you know, rejected other business in favor of
26:19
Speaker 2: being ready to go with this new product rollout for coke.
26:23
Speaker 1: And it's an interesting corporate position too, write interesting business
26:27
Speaker 1: arrangement because you are you are your own company. You
26:32
Speaker 1: are not Coca Cola. But if someone asks you what
26:35
Speaker 1: you make, you make one hundred percent Coca Cola products.
26:39
Speaker 1: It's got to like being a contract worker in a way.
26:42
Speaker 2: Uh.
26:42
Speaker 1: So this is all great news for Sergio and Brian.
26:47
Speaker 1: It is the type of stuff that sounds awesome in
26:50
Speaker 1: a boardroom, but the marketing is not as solid as
26:54
Speaker 1: it may have looked at first glance. People in general,
26:58
Speaker 1: as we know, tend to dislike change, especially if we
27:01
Speaker 1: feel a nostalgic or emotional relationship with the status quo.
27:07
Speaker 1: So this this cracked me up. I hope we all
27:11
Speaker 1: enjoy this too. In one of the taste tests facts
27:15
Speaker 1: or Takeaways, they found that somewhere around ten to twelve
27:19
Speaker 1: percent of customers weren't just saying they didn't like this
27:25
Speaker 1: new flavor. They said they were deeply angry at the
27:29
Speaker 1: idea that anybody would replace Coca Cola. They felt personally offended.
27:34
Speaker 1: They would stop drinking the stuff entirely if this crap
27:38
Speaker 1: was going to be the new flavor. That's a very
27:41
Speaker 1: visceral reaction to something as you know, mundane as soda pop.
27:46
Speaker 2: But still most people said that they you know, the
27:49
Speaker 2: focus group types would they would accept the change, though
27:53
Speaker 2: they also said it would take you know a little
27:56
Speaker 2: time to get used to.
27:59
Speaker 1: Yeah. And we know that this data is again not
28:03
Speaker 1: just coming from blind taste test, it's also coming from
28:06
Speaker 1: surveys and focus groups, and marketing calculus at the time
28:12
Speaker 1: placed much more importance on the surveys, especially because they
28:16
Speaker 1: were less negative than the taste test. So now they're
28:20
Speaker 1: armed with the information that works best for them. Our
28:23
Speaker 1: pals Sergio and Brian are able to convince the ZX
28:27
Speaker 1: to change Coke's Holy Grail formula in nineteen eighty five,
28:32
Speaker 1: and in this conversation they also, by the way, downplayed
28:37
Speaker 1: the repeated and consistent predictions of focus groups. Pretty much
28:43
Speaker 1: every focus group they asked told them the general public
28:47
Speaker 1: is not going to like it if you guys change
28:50
Speaker 1: the recipe. If you tell them that you're changing something
28:54
Speaker 1: they associate with, you know, roller skating rinks in summer
28:58
Speaker 1: camp and fun times as a child, they're going to
29:02
Speaker 1: hate you. What happens next has been reviewed, discussed, analyzed extensively,
29:09
Speaker 1: and obsessed over for decades. It remains a standard topic
29:14
Speaker 1: of study in business and marketing schools even today. So
29:19
Speaker 1: the first big discussion after green lighting this idea of
29:22
Speaker 1: what would become called new Coke was whether we make
29:26
Speaker 1: it a replacement entirely for the old stuff, or whether
29:30
Speaker 1: we make it a new, separate addition to Coke's roster. Right,
29:36
Speaker 1: we know stuff like this, It already happened recently. Diet
29:40
Speaker 1: Coke came out in nineteen eighty two. Side note, diet
29:43
Speaker 1: Pepsi came out in nineteen sixty four, well late to
29:46
Speaker 1: the game there, guys. But these bodily associates of Coke
29:51
Speaker 1: Proper were already really pod that they had to make
29:57
Speaker 1: diet coke. It threw off their whole production process. And
30:00
Speaker 1: so a lot of these companies had already sued Coca
30:04
Speaker 1: Cola over syrup price fixing, which we didn't know was
30:09
Speaker 1: a thing, and the situation was getting even stickier with
30:13
Speaker 1: the rollout of Cherry coke. Yeah, they were divided in
30:19
Speaker 1: the boardroom from the beginning. Some members of management were
30:22
Speaker 1: concerned that this would be a win for Pepsi if
30:25
Speaker 1: they had two separate versions.
30:27
Speaker 2: Of coke, and this, you know, immediately creates a problem
30:31
Speaker 2: of brand dilution and this idea of you know, just
30:35
Speaker 2: confusing the public, confusing their customers and cannibalizing their own sales.
30:39
Speaker 2: But Sergio and Brian did have support from the CEO.
30:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, the King is on your side. It turns out
30:48
Speaker 1: that our pal Roberto we mentioned that he had a
30:52
Speaker 1: background in the Bahamas. He's from Cuba. Originally he said,
30:57
Speaker 1: hang on, I've tried something like this in the past.
31:00
Speaker 1: Back in the early days of my career as a cokeman,
31:04
Speaker 1: I ran the Bahamas subsidiary, and we looked into local preferences.
31:09
Speaker 1: We tweaked the flavors slightly, and when we did that,
31:12
Speaker 1: we significantly improved sales in that market. So, you guys,
31:17
Speaker 1: says Robertel, I'm all about refinement and replacement. It worked
31:22
Speaker 1: before for me, so why can't it work now on
31:25
Speaker 1: a larger scale. He argued, the company needs to make
31:28
Speaker 1: the change not an addition to the product line, but
31:31
Speaker 1: a full replacement. And he says, we're not doing it
31:34
Speaker 1: in secret, We're doing it publicly. It is new coke
31:37
Speaker 1: or no coke. And we're also we're gonna have different
31:41
Speaker 1: packages and we'll have a little line that says new
31:43
Speaker 1: exclamation mark on the label. That's where we get the
31:46
Speaker 1: street name new Coke.
31:49
Speaker 2: Exactly new coke. Hets the market on April twenty third,
31:53
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty five, and that same week Coke stops production
31:58
Speaker 2: oof of the original formula. For a while, new coke
32:04
Speaker 2: was sold in the same coke packaging. The bottlers still
32:08
Speaker 2: had left over labels, cartons and cans, and there was
32:13
Speaker 2: a huge press conference in New York City to announce
32:17
Speaker 2: this initiative. However, it did not go well. PEPSI was
32:22
Speaker 2: likely responsible for this. Feeding reporters you know, uncomfortable questions,
32:29
Speaker 2: guait Sueta pointed out Coke's original formula had been altered
32:32
Speaker 2: in the past. This was not anything new, he said,
32:35
Speaker 2: specifically back in nineteen thirty five to get Kosher certification. However,
32:41
Speaker 2: he wouldn't acknowledge taste tests as their motivation because that
32:46
Speaker 2: would have implied the first formula wasn't like, you know,
32:49
Speaker 2: the American classic that everyone knew and loved to begin with. Instead,
32:54
Speaker 2: he got defensive, which is never a good.
32:57
Speaker 1: Look with reporters.
32:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, wow, you know, it seems like it's
33:01
Speaker 2: part of the course these days, but still a lot
33:03
Speaker 2: of good look and especially if you're you know, it's
33:06
Speaker 2: like it's like someone's saying, you're just not getting what
33:08
Speaker 2: I'm what I'm my vision is here.
33:10
Speaker 1: You know, you're a nasty woman. You should smile more.
33:13
Speaker 1: Uh uh, We're not here to villify Roberto. You guys
33:17
Speaker 1: know who we're talking about.
33:18
Speaker 2: Instead.
33:19
Speaker 1: Uh So, one of these reporters asked him if diet
33:24
Speaker 1: Coke would also be reformulated if assuming new Coke is
33:30
Speaker 1: a success, and our CEO flipped out. He famously replied, no,
33:35
Speaker 1: and I didn't assume that this is a success. This
33:39
Speaker 1: is a success.
33:41
Speaker 2: Oh no, man, just because you say it is, I
33:44
Speaker 2: doesn't doesn't mean it is.
33:46
Speaker 3: I mean, what's a more successful route of ever proving
33:50
Speaker 3: somebody wrong than just vehemently denying the truth.
33:53
Speaker 2: Well again, we're seeing quite a lot of that these days,
33:56
Speaker 2: and it's crazy making. But here's the thing.
33:59
Speaker 1: For time, New Coke was indeed a success story until
34:05
Speaker 1: it wasn't. And with that we're going to pause. We
34:10
Speaker 1: can't wait to get to the second leader of this
34:13
Speaker 1: two liter episode. Please tune in for the the crazy
34:18
Speaker 1: part of the story in our second part of the
34:22
Speaker 1: Bizarre Saga of New Coke. Big big thanks or super
34:25
Speaker 1: producer mister Max Williams, Big thanks to Oh gosh, does
34:29
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland ak the Twister drink Coca Cola?
34:33
Speaker 2: Does you know?
34:34
Speaker 3: I mean probably an Arcy Cola fan?
34:37
Speaker 2: I bet he is.
34:38
Speaker 1: Wow, everybody's catching strays today.
34:42
Speaker 2: No, it's true, ARSI call is not the worst. It's
34:44
Speaker 2: just it's just like kind of generic. It's just generic,
34:48
Speaker 2: and everything's generic compared to Coke Classic, especially New Coke.
34:52
Speaker 3: Okay, now I got a better one. I got better
34:53
Speaker 3: Jonathan Strickland goes to the world of coke so you
34:56
Speaker 3: can stand there and only drink Beverly.
34:58
Speaker 1: Oh, he loves bever Beverly is terrible. Yeah, that's the
35:02
Speaker 1: correct answer. I almost spat out my coke zero for
35:07
Speaker 1: anybody who doesn't know. Beverly is best described as a
35:12
Speaker 1: war crime. That you can drink it is. I think
35:16
Speaker 1: it's a digestive or yeah, it's a digestive.
35:19
Speaker 2: I think taste like for net hmm, okay, so liquid
35:23
Speaker 2: tube paste. It's just terrible. Yeah, not good. And that
35:27
Speaker 2: is something that you can I believe still to this day.
35:29
Speaker 2: Sample at the Coke Museum here in Atlanta, the World
35:31
Speaker 2: of Coke.
35:32
Speaker 1: Yes, that's the way they ruin in the field trip
35:35
Speaker 1: for countless school children. Your faithful correspondents include it. Speaking
35:40
Speaker 1: to a correspondent's Big Big thanks to doctor Rachel Big
35:43
Speaker 1: Spinach Lance, as well as the rude Dudes of Ridiculous Crime.
35:47
Speaker 2: Huge thanks to aj Bahamas, Jacobs, the Puzzler, and Jonathan
35:51
Speaker 2: Strickland aka the Quizzer, as well as us Jeff Coats
35:54
Speaker 2: and Christophroscio. Is here in spirit.
35:56
Speaker 1: All right, folks, crack open a cold one for us.
35:59
Speaker 2: Will be back see you next time, folks. For more
36:09
Speaker 2: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
36:12
Speaker 2: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.