Original subtitles

the soft drink industry is a 100 billion

dollar international juggernaut the

coca-cola company and PepsiCo controlled

vast empires which reach into

practically every corner of the globe

through huge networks of bottlers

distributors and retailers there's

hardly a spot on earth where you can't

quench your thirst with a Coke or a

Pepsi so heavily promoted their presence

is practically inescapable coke and

pepsi are twin icons of American culture

such everyday familiar symbols that a

time before their existence is almost

unfathomable it was 1886 the height of

the Gilded Age the civil war was over

and America was hurtling headlong into

the modern age

electric lights hummed victrolas cranked

up vaudeville tunes horseless carriages

sputtered to life and the first

skyscrapers thrust toward the sky

against this backdrop this whirling

kaleidoscope where everything was fresh

new and bubbling over with fervent

energy the world's most famous trademark

was born launched with a tiny

advertisement in Atlanta newspaper

coca-cola was created by an Atlanta

pharmacy owner named John doc Pemberton

the Pemberton was no doctor he just

purchased a $5 medical license and

started calling himself doc a visit to

dr. Merton usually included a vapor bath

and a forcible cleansing of the

digestive system he believed you could

cure all human ills by in fact drinking

poisons and and purging your body the

1880s with a heyday of miracle cures and

patent medicines store shelves were

crammed with a bewildering array of

elixirs and tonics of dubious

reliability Pemberton's own concoctions

included triplets liver pills and

compound extracted still NGO dr.

Sanford's great invigorate ER and Eureka

oil federal regulation of food and drugs

was years away and for the patent

medicine business the sky was the limit

you could concoct any sort of Mao potion

and claim all sorts of miraculous cures

for it and in fellin most patent

medicines contained copious amounts of

alcohol or even stronger drugs often

both laudanum a popular painkiller was a

mixture of opium and alcohol others

contain powerful doses of what was in

1886 the latest wonder drug cocaine

cocaine had been relatively unknown in

America until 1884 when former president

and civil war hero ulysses s grant was

stricken with throat cancer and was

prescribed cocaine by his doctor grams

dying and gained relief from his

suffering by the use of cocaine which

was in turn publicized and he was

probably the most famous and popular

figure in the country at that point so a

lot of people had reason to think that

cocaine was it was a good thing and doc

Pemberton was one of those people among

his early product was a concoction

called French wine coca Pemberton used

cocaine and caffeine and and Sarah's

early creations his most successful one

before he turned to coca-cola was a

combination of wine which of course is

alcohol cocaine and caffeine in it

French wine coca was an immediate hit

but its success was short-lived months

after the potent mixture hit drug store

shelves French wine Coca's main

ingredient was outlawed it wasn't the

cocaine it was the wine in 1885 Atlanta

voted to go dry

Pemberton panicked because his French

wine coca just come out in 1885 it was

doing real well and he thought what am I

going to do if they make this illegal

what he did was get out of the patent

medicine business and into the soft

drink business there were five immensely

popular soda fountains in Atlanta that

offered cool refreshment from the city's

blistering summer heat Pemberton wanted

a beverage that would sell at these

popular fountains

these huge soda fountains that that were

like palaces of Onyx and marble with

gorgeous accoutrements and they would

they would create 300 different soft

drinks at one soda fountain and so there

was this immense competition with soft

drinks like hires root beer and white

rock ginger ale already successful

Pemberton's challenge was to transform

his wine and cocaine mixture into a soft

drink

what he came up with was anything but

soft

thanks to Eddy doses of cocaine and

another stimulant extract of Cola coma

spelled with a cave was a nut native to

West Africa it's active ingredient was

nothing more than caffeine Pemberton

merely combined two popular stimulants

in a single cold beverage that since it

contained no alcohol could be sold at

soda fountains Pemberton tinkered with

the French wine coca formula to try to

take out the alcohol and he added a

bunch of sugar he added some acid and

basically he came up with coca cola and

it was Pemberton's bookkeeper Frank

Robinson who came up with the name Frank

Robinson had the inspiration to think of

the name Coca Cola as he liked the way

it sounded and he changed the spelling

of Cola from beginning with a K to a C

besides a memorable name Robinson also

supplied the trademark spending months

perfecting the flowing script he had a

bookkeepers ability to write beautiful

Spencerian script and that's actually

his handwriting that became the

trademark that's familiar all around the

world today but what would become the

world's most recognized brand name

almost failed in its first year he was a

rotten business man and he'd gone

bankrupt several times and you did not

want to be a business partner of dr.

Burton sales were slow only 25 gallons

of syrup sold the first year

to make matters worse Pemberton's health

was failing he was suffering from a

problem that afflicted many druggists of

the day it was by this time addicted to

cocaine so this I would say contributed

to his lack of business acumen a just

spaced out mr. time in the winter of

1888 Pemberton Lay Dying it looked as if

coca-cola might die with him but that

winter something would happen that would

ensure cokes future when we return a

splitting headache transforms the

failing soft drink into a household word

[Music]

the coca plant had been chewed by

natives of Peru and Bolivia for over

2,000 years and was reputed to act as a

stimulant aid to digestion aphrodisiac

and life extender the cola wars will

return on modern marvels

[Music]

Atlanta Georgia is one of the busiest

fastest-growing cities in the sutler

and the same is true back in the 1880s

but it was a place where men of ambition

aim to strike it rich

among these eager men was a high-strung

but determined 21 year old druggist

apprentice from Villa Rica Georgia named

ASA Kendler he came to Atlanta with a

dollar and seventy five cents in his

pocket like a real life a ratio Alger

and I went around all the drugstores

looking for a job one of which father

while he was Pemberton's and who didn't

harm turned down by Pemberton Candler

landed a job at another pharmacist shop

within four years he was in business for

himself he was not the creative genius

that Pemberton was and he was not the

scholar that temperance n' was but he

was a hustler he made a lot you know he

wanted to make money and he knew how to

do it Chandler's long hours of work paid

off

but his success came at a price

excruciating headaches he was plainly a

very tightly wound man who suffered from

headaches from time to time brought on

by by stress yet Cantler stress was

nothing compared to Pemberton's troubles

flat broken near-death coca-cola's

creator offered to sell the business to

the young druggist he once refused to

hire at first he wasn't interested but

then Candler racked by one of his

recurring migraines sampled his first

cook he'd tried quite a few different

hit acremant is nothing at work but Ron

coca-cola and it seemed to work

his headache cured canler's mind was

made up for $2,300 Candler became the

sole proprietor of coca-cola in May 1889

counselors first move was to refine the

formula and rid coca-cola of its

medicinal flavor he had a more sugar for

example he added some citric products to

mask the taste and to give a little bit

more by night a little bit less sweet

because of all the sugar that had to be

added beyond cokes taste the dour deeply

religious cancer also had serious

reservations about the trademark

ingredient

he sent a sample of coke syrup off to a

chemist to find out how much cocaine was

actually in it and the report came back

that it was substantial enough to be

worrisome Candler devised a new means of

exhausting these coca leaves so that

there was no more than an infant

estimate of cocaine as great from that

day forward coca-cola would contain only

trace amounts of its trademark

ingredients in a way Coca Cola's names

is very misleading because there's

virtually no coca and virtually no Cola

in it coca cola's potent combination of

sugar and caffeine still packed a punch

only now it tasted good to Frank

Robinson Pemberton's former bookkeeper

and now canler's chief of advertising

once again provided the inspiration to

take the product to the next level he

launched a pioneering ad campaign among

the first direct mail campaigns in

history they would go to the biggest

pharmacists in the town who had a soda

fountain and they would ask him who his

best customers were and they'd get their

addresses and they would mail them free

coupons for coca-cola driven by

Robinson's aggressive advertising

coca-cola expanded to soda fountains

across the country sales jumped to half

a million gallons of syrup by 1901

roughly 60 million cokes

America seemed addicted to coca-cola

the only problem was that some people

began to wonder why there were a lot of

stories begin appearing in in various

national publications about people who

were afflicted with addictions to

coca-cola and other soft drinks that

contain could contain cocaine and there

was an outcry building against it in

1906 with public pressure mounting

cancer went back to the laboratory and

developed a complicated process that rid

the drink of any trace of the drug once

and for all this beverage this magic

concoction Coca Cola a simple a simple

refreshment advertised now only as a

refreshment having no no magic qualities

no health inducing properties but just

simple refreshment that the success of

Atlanta holy water a Coca Cola was

repeated over and over again its critics

silenced Coca Cola's sales continued to

climb almost all the coke sales came

from selling syrup to soda fountains

back then carbonated drinks were seldom

sold in bottles at all changed in 1899

when the first coca-cola bottling plant

was set up in nearby Chattanooga soon

bottling plants sprang up across the

country now it seemed coke was

everywhere coca-cola was a pervasive

kind of thing you'd see it on Main

Street you'd see it at your your Civic

Club you'd see it at the high-school

football game soon others attempted to

cash in on coke success with sound-alike

names and identical-looking bottles and

logos cokes competitors had an easy time

confusing the drink buying

determined to set his product apart

Candler directed his bothers to come up

with a unique distinctive package the

result unveiled in 1916 was so simple

yet so original it became an American

icon it was the same everywhere a

universal bottle that even a blind man

when the bottle is placed in his hand he

can feel its contours and know that that

is coca-cola the pains the company took

to protect the formula were equaled only

by how vigorously coke defended its name

coke militantly protected its trademark

against anyone who tried to use a

similar name and they were successful in

literally hundreds of infringement suits

and they drove competing Coca's and

colas out of business for years

if Candler seemed obsessive about

protecting his trademark it was nothing

compared to how obsessive he was about

protecting the ingredients of coca-cola

the only written copy of the formula was

kept in a bank Walt and why not

coca-cola had made Candler fabulously

wealthy success that he attributed as

much to the taste of coke as to the

marketing and distribution operation he

had created but despite his phenomenal

success Candler was dissatisfied I think

he felt guilty about the massive wealth

he was accumulating selling coca-cola I

don't think he thought the product was

terribly worthwhile in 1919 Candler and

his family decided to sell coca-cola

among those interested was a powerful

Atlanta banker named Ernest Woodruff

almost everybody hated Ernest Woodruff

he was a unpleasant person by all

accounts although I found this wonderful

quote from a contemporary newspaper from

around 1919 saying Ernest Woodruff is

not a companionable man and he has few

friends but when he calls the dollars

come Chandler did not want to sell his

company to a man like Woodruff so when

his family accepted an offer to sell for

twenty five million dollars he figured

Woodruff was out of the running he think

you're drunk he was considered a shark

and a sharp operator and someone not to

be entirely trusted and ASA Candler in

particular would have nothing to do with

him he considered Ernest Woodruff to be

an unsavory figure and so it was a big

surprise days a Candler when he found

out who had actually bought coca-cola

Woodruff wanted coca-cola merely as an

investment he had no real interest in

running the company in 1923 Woodruff

turned coca-cola over to his 33 year old

son Robert the story goes that Robert

took the job with the explicit

understanding that his father would not

be countermanding everything he did

would not be looking over his shoulder

that he would really be the boss of the

company

and indeed he became known as the boss

that was his nickname unlike his father

Robert was very interested in running

the company he oversaw virtually every

facet of the operation from production

to marketing but he overlooked one small

detail when we returned coca-cola

bundles the chance to crush a struggling

upstart challenger that would one day

emerge as cokes greatest nemesis in 1891

of the first coca-cola slogans read the

wonderful nerve and brain tonic and

remarkable therapeutic agent the cola

wars will return on modern marvels

[Music]

well the colas portion was made in the

bustling metropolis of Atlanta

pepsi-cola originated in a more remote

location it was created in 1898 in New

Bern North Carolina by a pharmacist

named Caleb Bradham Kayla was a druggist

a pharmacist who liked to fool around

with a soda fountain then came up with a

drink at that time was called Brad's

drink very popular in New Bern marketing

for it supposed the digital quality's

Pepsi's patent medicine origins were

similar to cokes with one noted

exception rather than coca-cola which

was created as a Madison Pepsi was

essentially a meant to be a drink from

the very first as a refreshing pepper

operon certainly with the caffeine that

was in it from the Kola nut it would do

that in 1902 Bradham renamed Brad's

drink Pepsi Cola and just like Coca Cola

the name was misleading Bradham used the

name column from the popularity of coal

at that time and he combined that with a

pepsin which aids digestion and that was

the one of the early advertising claims

of Pepsi Cola that did a digestion

although Pepsi never had any pepsin in

it by 1907 Pepsi was selling 100,000

gallons of syrup a year less than 10

years later

Radames budding Pepsi Empire had grown

to nearly 300 bottling operations in 24

states it became an instant success by

about 1910 Pepsi Cola was being sold

throughout North and South Carolina

Virginia Georgia Alabama so it had done

very well very quickly

then in the midst of World War one

disaster struck sugar prices shot up

dramatically to keep pepsi flowing into

the nation soda fountains Bratton took a

huge gamble random decided to bite the

bullet and order a lot of sugar and buy

sugar futures at the high price because

he thought would go higher unfortunately

the price of sugar dropped from 22 cents

down to below three cents a pound again

almost overnight and the Pensacola

Company was simply ruined ruined and out

of business with his company shut down

Bratton returned to his drugstore the

Pepsi story would have ended then and

there if it weren't for a blunder by

coca-cola

after the war and aided by prohibition

Coca Cola's sales skyrocketed reaching

23 million dollars in 1923 with the bars

shut down soda fountains did a booming

business that not even the Great

Depression could dent according to

Barron's magazine that merry symphony of

nickels and dimes rolling into myriad

cash registers across the nation and

eventually into the coca-cola company's

treasury has meant a remarkably steady

income both in good times and bad

lost candy stores a new york-based chain

of soda fountains alone sold nearly 4

million cokes a year in 1932 Lofts

president the bottom line minded Charles

guff approached Woodruff and coca-cola

demanding a discount on the syrup for

his fund ins gut thought that he should

get a discount the Coca Cola was so high

and mighty they didn't give anybody

discounts so guff bought Pepsi when it

was in one of its perennial bankruptcies

and he started selling it in his soda

fountains but with the lofts doors as

its only outfit it wasn't long before

Pepsi was verging on bankruptcy once

again at this point he decide that maybe

he had done the best thing and bringing

Pepsi cult aloft swallowing his

considerable pride guff went back to

Woodruff and offered to sell Pepsi to

him

Coco listen you know you've got nothing

we're not interested and as I say the

rest is history it was a blunder because

he could have eliminated his principle

competition for a very cheap price

Woodruff had missed a golden opportunity

to crush Pepsi before it became a threat

worse Woodruff Farragut's only stiffened

guts result in 1934 all of America was

in the grips of the Great Depression

millions were out of work and money was

tight a nickel was a lot of money to

depression starved Americans gov came up

with a plan to give people more for

their money and keep his company afloat

he managed to buy some old beer bottles

and beer bottles in those days had paper

labels so that you could put on a new

label for the brawny brand you wanted

and he bought a lot of them for very

little money and he sold at 12 ounce

bottle for five cents at that time every

other soft it was being sold six ounces

for a nickel

within days all the pepsi-cola stock

they had it was gone people love the 12

ounce for a nickel

although Pepsi's advertisement at that

time was centered around a nickel twice

as much for nickel America's biggest

nickel drink a nickel was really a lot

of money and the fact that you can pay a

nickel get twice as much really

influenced a lot of people to buy Pepsi

Cola instead of Coca Cola in just six

months

Pepsi went from bankruptcy to turning a

$100,000 profit a Pepsi sales were still

minuscule compared to cokes but Pepsi

was alive down in Atlanta the giant of

the Cola business was suddenly anxious

when we return Coke and Pepsi battle it

out in a grudge match for number one

John

dr. Merton was a Confederate

lieutenant-colonel earned a medical

degree at 19 and set up a top-rated lab

for chemical analysis and manufacture

the cola wars will return on modern

marvels

[Music]

as World War two raged in Europe the

slumbering giant of American industry

awakened steel mills aircraft factories

in shipyards sprang to life to support

the war effort but the war presented a

serious challenge to Coke and Pepsi when

world war ii broke out coca-cola was

immediately confronted with the threat

of sugar rationing that would probably

cut its domestic sales by half while his

management team was panicking Woodruff

seized the initiative and went off to

Washington and tried to argue with the

government and tell them that coca-cola

was a wartime necessity and to a

remarkable extent he succeeded soon

millions of cases of coca-cola were

being supplied to military training

camps but Woodruff had managed to do

more than just secure the exclusive

rights to sell soft drinks to servicemen

he dealt Pepsi a devastating blow as

well any Coca Cola that went to the

Troops was the exempt from sugar

rationing and Pepsi did not get this

while coke it unrestricted access to

rationed sugar and other commodities

Pepsi struggled there was a bother in

West Virginia who during the World War

two could not get enough sugar for Pepsi

so what he did is he also had a candy

business he melted down all his rock

candy and extracted the pepper sugar of

it for his Pepsi coca-cola on the other

hand had full access to all the sugar

they needed

wherever American GIs went from the

North African desert to the jungles of

the Pacific Coca Cola followed at the

coca-cola company I remember a telegram

that was framed and and put there on the

fourth floor offices the executive suite

and it said send six coca-cola bottling

plants Ike

during World War two American servicemen

consumed 10 billion bottles of coke the

cokes support of the war effort was more

than just racking up sales it was the

single greatest marketing coup in the

company's history coca-cola provided the

GIS with a taste of home and it was

there as they came back from battle

often at the very front lines

he had technical advisors of Coca Cola

Colonels if you will who were there to

see that the bottling was done right

that was different from product I

daresay like spam that some GIS had less

pleasant memories of the coca-cola

became an icon to the American GI what

began as a mercenary business decision

ended up taking on a life of its own and

and the American GI came to have a

devotion to coke it was like a letter

from your sweetheart

pour time for play of course means forth

they're still the neap are used to the

devotion of a generation of servicemen

coca-cola entered the 50s feeling

invincible Woodruff and coca-cola all

but turned their backs to the threat

posed by PepsiCo with a great contempt

that Robert Woodruff and the other

leaders of coca-cola had for Pepsi is

it's almost amusing now they called it

the imitator we would refer to the

competitor as the Pecola we have to look

out for that cooler over here or over

there or at that important supermarket

or food store t Cola will make a run at

us Pecola

[Laughter]

Woodruff and Coca Cola had good reason

to feel invulnerable just becoming its

president in 1923 Woodruff had led coke

on a meteoric climb

the drink now had a worldwide presence

with annual sales approaching 1 billion

dollars Woodruff that proven is worth to

his father and a coca-cola stockholders

many of whom he made very rich a single

$40 share purchased in 1919 was now in

1950 worth nearly $5,000 secure in his

dominance of the soft drink industry

Woodruff let the company coast along you

had Woodruff refusing to to change the

things that had worked for him and I

think a lot of successful businessmen

have that problem but he insisted on

having one price the nickel even as the

cost of ingredients was going on one

product coca-cola no other flavors for

the vending machines that were now

popping up and only one size of

container the old six and a half ounce

bottle but in the 50s and 60s the soft

drink business along with the rest of

the world was rapidly changing companies

were expanding and diversifying their

products and marketing efforts Pepsi was

controlled not by one man like Woodruff

at coke but by a conglomerate of CEOs

brand managers and directors

as the soft drink industry grew more and

more products flavours and packages

entered the market each year even a

staunch traditionalist like Woodruff

reluctantly had to follow suit

finally in 1955 Woodruff allowed a

bigger Coca Cola and eventually like in

1961 they came out with sprite so they

began to come out with other flavors

there would be other changes to the cola

wars were escalating and there was a new

all-powerful weapon in the battle

television say what I have more fun and

come on along and let's join the Pepsi

crowd trailing Coke in sales Pepsi made

full use of the new medium faced with a

world war two generations fanatical

devotion to coca-cola Pepsi simply

ignored them focusing on their kids

instead places the people they love and

Pensacola is their one Cola that belongs

with every happy hopeful moment we came

upon the notion of instead of talking

about the product so much let's talk

about the consumer that uses it the type

of person that would buy or use this

product and it was Willie at that time

termed a necktie philosophy meaning that

if you look at a man's tie you can tell

something about him usually I mean it's

it's right there and then was true about

what soft drink he would hold in his

hand that if he had a Pepsi Cola ends

and chances are he would be less

traditional he might be more youthful it

didn't take long for coke to realize

that if they seated the youth market to

Pepsi eventually they'd run out of

customers coke struck back with one of

the most famous commercials ever

produced

[Music]

the funny story behind that is that the

president of the company at the time did

not think that that ad was a very good

idea he thought it was a little too

pacifistic a little too treacly to

saccharine sweet but he shrugged and he

said well that's why we have an

advertising department so he gave the

green light to it and became immensely

popular song that I think captured

something of a generational feeling

despite the success of Coca Cola's

extraordinary ad it was too little too

late

Betsy's market share continued to climb

and in 1975 Pepsi went for the jugular

they launched a massive ad campaign

called the Pepsi challenge we did an

illegitimate taste tests with all kinds

of specifications on the freshness of

the two products being tested the

temperature of the two products and so

forth and alternating which one was

tasted first and which one wasn't and

all through those tests we learned that

Pepsi when it was not identified was

preferred by 1984 Pepsi had grown from

depression near underdog to a vicious

attack dog Pepsi's market share now

trailed Koch's by less than three

percentage points

Pepsi sales were were about equal to

coca-cola that's something that never

occurred before and in some markets uh

Pepsi had even pulled ahead taste after

years of relentless and aggressive

marketing the imitator had finally

caught up in Coca Cola's Atlanta

headquarters panic ensued

when we return coca-cola stages a

classic blunder John Pemberton's first

soft drink was sold to the public at the

soda fountain and Jacobs pharmacy in

Atlanta on May 8 1886 the cola wars will

return on modern marvels

[Music]

in the early 1980s coca-cola was in

trouble Pepsi's relentless pursuit of

the youth market and their highly

successful Pepsi challenge campaign had

brought them to within a few share

points of cokes once insurmountable

market dominance unbeknownst to the

public and all but the highest of coke

management the company began to tinker

with the most guarded most sacred part

of Coca Cola's Empire the formula the

decision was made that that they

actually had to change the formula to

make a little bit more like Pepsi to

fend off the competition the change

would have been unthinkable if Robert

Woodruff still held a tight rein on the

company but by the 1980s Coca Cola's

aging patriarch was a fading relic a

mere shadow of the man who'd run the

company for over 60 years I don't

believe that Robert Woodruff in 1985 was

capable of understanding much he was 95

years old by that of severely diminished

capacity was virtually blind and deaf

running a company in Woodruff's plates

was Roberto Gus waiter my ass Roberto

Gazeta who was born in Cuba had become

the CEO and had announced early on that

there were no sacred cows there were no

sacred formulas he would do anything to

be aggressive and to get this company

going again to going no one at coca-cola

would dare admit it more likely Cola

they had ridiculed for years as the

imitator they were an awkward position

they couldn't say we're making a case

more like Pepsi which is what they were

doing and they couldn't really explain

why they were changing it so they just

said well it's new and improved I do ask

unshaken in his belief that New Coke was

a superior product cause way too

launched a new formula with a tremendous

fanfare inviting over 700 members of the

press to the unveiling at New York's

Lincoln Center

across the country premiere parties

trumpeted new coke Robin you nation

coca-cola and you too will like it just

is everybody here and Robert Woodruff

Park enjoys the taste of coca-cola well

y'all come on down to the bar we despite

the dramatic unveiling things quickly

soured for goys widow and new cook I

don't like it have you tried the new

coaster

what do you think of that so I get very

disappointed I think we've lost the

American tradition that the real taste

is gone down here what the coca-cola

people had forgotten was how well they

had succeeded with their advertising how

well they had made coca-cola a part of

people's everyday lives within a matter

of days goes waiter was rudely awakened

to a fact that Candler and Woodruff had

long known coca-cola had an intensely

loyal following not the real thing

calls flooded cokes 800-number newspaper

editorials blasted the formula change

and new cokes rollout parties in 45

cities turned into angry protests

hundreds and thousands and ultimately

tens of thousands of bitterly angry

phone calls came in and a lot of them

were from people who didn't even drink

coca-cola was just American citizens who

thought that something familiar and

important in their lives had been taken

away from them without their permission

they got these letters saying I wouldn't

be as upset if you'd burn the flag on my

lawn I wouldn't be as upset as if you

told me God was dead I wouldn't be as

upset if you change the American

Constitution I mean this is the changing

the flavor of a soft drink and it

dominated the news for three months it

was unbelievable and finally and they

had psychologists listening in on the

800-number

wine who said that these people sounded

as if a family member had died that was

the way they felt we have planned the

attack the angry letters poured in and

one message rang through loud and clear

there's no way you're not taking my

coca-cola away if Pepsi was the imitator

just what was new coke all the company's

years of smug superiority came crashing

down

Pepsi of course had a field day

Pepsi very cleverly declared a holiday

in celebration that announced that they

had won the cola wars let everybody off

for a day

the formula change boosted more than

pepsi self-confidence Pepsi sales surged

as well Pepsi became the top-selling

Cola in the world by July boys Wetty had

had enough the old formula was back and

soon so was cokes market share the news

about the introduction of coca-cola

classic ran on the Dow Jones wire at

3:18 p.m. yesterday

once coca-cola classic came back it was

wildly successful the same beverage that

had been losing market share for 20

years started to gain it so much so that

many people think that they did this on

purpose there's this sort of folklore

that the coke guys did this whole new

coke thing fiasco as a marketing ploy

because of what happened from it or let

me tell you it was not a marketing ploy

they screwed up there was the marketing

blunder of the century but it came out

well for them today Coke and Pepsi are

locked in mortal kombat for market share

and not just in Cola both companies have

expanded into multiple brands coke with

Minute Maid sprite surge and a multitude

of others other Pepsi brands include

Tropicana Mountain Dew and slice and

then there are the myriad offsprings of

their marquee products FC also owns

Frito Lay the number one snack food

company in the world in the mid 1980s

flush with cash both companies were on a

buying spree expanding well beyond the

beverage markets they dominated coke

bought Columbia Pictures

PepsiCo bought Kentucky Fried Chicken

Taco Bell and Pizza they both since

divested those spin-offs sticking to

what they do best marketing beverages

the cola wars continued unabated a

worldwide struggle that's more than just

a war for market share

more than a mere battle for the

consumers spare change the passions of

cola loyalty come from all the

psychology of the advertising and

marketing that we grow up with families

or coke families or Pepsi families it's

almost like North and South and what the

product actually tastes like is only a

small part of that you can't really

separate the psychological impact of the

trademark and what it evokes in you from

the actual product itself to some the

cooler war is about far more than simple

rival companies or rival flavors it's an

epic battle between two competing

ideologies between right and wrong or

good and evil I believe the Coke and

Pepsi together this cold war they've

been in for decades now actually help

each other sell an awful lot of product

I think they've been they've been good

for each other

so had coke ended up with a monopoly on

the Cola beverage what would have

happened who knows