The New Coke Catastrophe. What Really Happened?

Legend and lore surrounds most great brands. Here's one that actually makes sense. New Coke was a guise to separate the bottler and their iron clad contract from the true secret formula . The bottling contracts, especially the ones set up by the Candlers, were a license to print money. Every bottler, on his death bed, would grab his son by the lapel and say with his last breath, "son whatever happens don't let them change that contract". Everyone knew that sugar was a commodity that moved with the markets. the profit of the company often hinged on the price of sugar. But no one was going to deny Big Daddy's last dying words. In the 70's, Coke was stuck between a rock and a hard place. The price was fixed in the contract and the price of sugar was rising. The syrup business just wasn't what it used to be.

Then came the Pepsi Challenge. Pepsi, the great imitator, had done a sip test with consumers showing that America preferred the sweeter taste of Pepsi by the sip. It has been well documented that they would prefer the taste of Coke if whey were asked to drink a serving vs a sip. But that wasn't what marketing was about in the 70's. Coke's share started to plummet as Pepsi continued to push this message to the American public. With great concern from shareholders, New Coke was conceived and launched to flank Pepsi's advances. With this move came the greatest public protest since the civil rights movement in Atlanta. Everyone was amazed that they touched the sacred formula. In all this chaos, the North Avenue Brain Trust came up with a brilliant idea. They could formulate a new drink and call it "Coke Classic". By replacing the sugar with high fructose corn syrup or HFC, they could appease the Old Coke loyalists with taste and the new cheaper formula would not have the bottler price agreement attached. This was much better for the KO symbol than trying to sell Dr. Pemberton's caramel concoction. You see, HFC was cheap and plentiful. The cheaper to produce HFC Classic Formula positioned the brand for exponential growth in the 1980's. The profit with existing bottlers skyrocketed and the low cost paved the way for an affordable drink to distribute to every corner of the earth.

Over twenty years later, Americans are starting to realize that food science is just not as good as the real thing. In Mexico, sugar is cheaper the HFC. And guess what? They keep the sugar in the formula. Next time you are in the grocery store, go to the "ethnic" section and pick up a Mexican Coke. Do your own taste test with your local HFC Coke product and see for yourself. Mexican Coke is the real thing. It's exactly what Dr. Pemberton would have prescribed (except without the cocaine).