Coca-Cola

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Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola, also known as Coke, began in the chaos of the post-Reconstruction South. In May 1886, Georgia pharmacist John Styth Pemberton succeeded in creating what he intended, a temperance drink. With cries against alcohol reaching a fever pitch in the region Pemberton worked to create a drink that could satisfy the anti-alcohol crowd as well as his need to turn a profit. In the ensuing mixing and re-mixing he came up with the syrup base for Coca-Cola. The reddish brown color and "spicy" flavor of the drink helped mask the illegal alcohol that some of his early customers added to the beverage. Little did he know that this new drink, made largely of sugar and water, would quickly become the most popular soft drink in the United States and, eventually, the entire world.

Although John Pemberton created the formula for Coca-Cola it fell to others to turn the product into a profitable enterprise. Fellow pharmacist Asa Candler bought the rights to Coke in 1888, and he would begin to push the drink to successful heights. Through a variety of marketing tools Candler put Coca-Cola onto the long road to prosperity. Calendars, pens, metal trays, posters, and a variety of other items were emblazoned with the Coke image and helped breed familiarity with the drink. Additionally, although the beverage included negligible amounts of cocaine, Candler gave in to the sentiment of the Progressive Era and removed all traces of cocaine from Coca-Cola in 1903. Candler followed the slight formula switch with an advertising campaign emphasizing the purity of the drink. The ad campaign was enhanced by the development of the unique Coca-Cola bottle in 1913. The new Coke bottle, with its wide middle and ribbed sides, made the Coca-Cola bottle, and by relation its contents, instantly identifiable.

For all of the success that he had engineered at Coca-Cola, Asa Candler lost interest in the soft drink business. Candler turned the company over to his sons who would in turn eventually sell it to Ernest Woodruff. It was Woodruff, and eventually his son, Robert, who guided the company to its position of leadership in the soda-pop industry. As one company employee remarked "Asa Candler gave us feet, but Woodruff gave us wings." The Woodruffs expanded company operations, initiated the vending-machine process, changed fountain distribution to ensure product uniformity and quality, and presided over the emergence of the six-pack. It was also the Woodruffs who recognized that Coke's greatest asset was not what it did, but what it could potentially represent; accordingly, they expanded upon company advertising in order to have Coke identified as the pre-eminent soft drink and, ultimately, a part of Americana.

Coca-Cola advertising was some of the most memorable in the history of American business. Through the work of artists such as Norman Rockwell and Haddon Sundblom, images of Coca-Cola were united with other aspects of American life. In fact, it was not until Sundblom, through a Coke advertisement, provided the nation with a depiction of the red-suited, rotund Santa Claus, that such an image (and by relation Coca-Cola) was identified with the American version of Christmas. Coke's strategic marketing efforts, through magazines, billboards, calendars, and various other product giveaways embla-zoned with the name Coca-Cola, made the product a part of American culture. The success of Coke advertising gave the product an appeal that stretched far beyond its simple function as a beverage to quench the thirst. Coke became identified with things that were American, as much an icon as the Statue of Liberty or Mount Rushmore. This shift to icon status was catalyzed by the company's actions during World War II.

At the outset of the war Coke found its business potentially limited by wartime production statutes. Sugar, a major ingredient in the drink, was to be rationed in order to ensure its availability to the nation's military forces. The company, though not necessarily facing a loss of market share, faced the serious possibility of zero growth during the conflict. Therefore, Robert Woodruff announced that the company would work to ensure that Coke was available to every American serviceman overseas. Through this bold maneuver Coca-Cola was eventually placed on the list of military necessities and allowed to circumvent limits on its sugar supply. Also, thanks in part to Chief of Staff George C. Marshall, the company was able to avoid the massive expense of ensuring Coke's delivery. Marshall believed that troop morale would be improved by the availability of Coca-Cola, and that it was a good alternative to alcohol. Therefore, he allowed for entire bottling plants to be transported overseas at government expense. Thanks to Marshall and others Coca-Cola was able to expand its presence overseas at a faster rate and at less expense than other beverages.

Thousands of American servicemen, from Dwight Eisenhower to the common soldier, preferred Coke to any other soft drink. The availability of the beverage in every theater of the war helped Coke to be elevated in the minds of GI's as a slice of America. In many of their letters home, soldiers identified the drink as one of the things they were fighting for, in addition to families and sweethearts. Bottles of Coke were auctioned off when supplies became limited, were flown along with bombing sorties, and found their way onto submarines. One GI went so far as to call the liquid "nectar of the Gods." Thanks to its presence in the war effort, the affinity which GI's held for the beverage, and the establishment of a presence overseas, Coke became identified by Americans and citizens of foreign countries with the American Way. After World War II, Coca-Cola was on its way to becoming one of a handful of brands recognized around the world.

However, the presence of Coca-Cola was not always welcomed overseas. During the political and ideological battles of the Cold War, Coke was targeted by European communists as a symbol of the creeping hegemony of the United States. The drink found itself under attack in many European countries and in some quarters its existence was denounced as "Coca-Colonialism." In addition, the drink often found its presence opposed by local soft drink and beverage manufacturers. A variety of beverage manufacturers in Germany, Italy, and France actively opposed the spread of Coca-Cola in their countries. Despite the opposition, however, the spread of Coca-Cola continued throughout the Cold War. In some cases the sale of the soft drink preceded or immediately followed the establishment of relations between the United States and another country. By the 1970s, the worldwide presence of Coke was such that company officials could (and did) claim that, "When you don't see a Coca-Cola sign, you have passed the borders of civilization."

Beginning in the 1970s, Coca-Cola found its greatest challenges in the domestic rather than international arena. Facing the growth of its rival, Pepsi-Cola, Coke found itself increasingly losing its market share. Coke executives were even more worried when the Pepsi Challenge convincingly argued that even among Coke loyalists the taste of Pepsi was preferred to that of Coke. The results of the challenge led Coke officials to conclude that the taste of the drink was inferior to that of Pepsi and that a change in the formula was necessary. The result of this line of thinking was the marketing debacle surrounding New Coke.

In the history of corporate marketing blunders the 1983 introduction of New Coke quickly took its place alongside the Edsel. After New Coke was introduced company telephone operators found themselves besieged by irate consumers disgusted with the product change. Coke's error was that blind taste tests like the Pepsi Challenge prevented the consumer from associating the thoughts and traditions with a particular soda. Caught up in ideas of product inferiority the company seemingly forgot its greatest asset—the association that it had with the life experiences of millions of consumers. Many Americans associated memories of first dates, battlefield success, sporting events, and other occasions with the consumption of Coca-Cola. Those associations were something that could not be ignored or rejected simply because when blindfolded customers preferred the taste of one beverage over another. In many cases the choice of a particular soft drink was something passed down from parents to children. Consequently, the taste tests would not make lifelong Coke drinkers switch to a new beverage; the tradition and association with Coca-Cola were too powerful for such a thing to occur.

After introducing New Coke the company found itself assaulted not for changing the formula of a simple soft drink, but for tampering with a piece of Americana. Columnists editorialized that the next step would be changing the flag or tearing down the Statue of Liberty. Many Americans rejected New Coke not for its taste but for its mere existence. Tradition, as the Coca-Cola company was forced to admit, took precedence over taste. Four months after it was taken off of the shelves, the traditionally formulated Coke was returned to the marketplace under the name Coca-Cola Classic. Company president Don Keough summed up the episode by saying "Some critics will say Coca-Cola made a marketing mistake. Some critics will say that we planned the whole thing. The truth is we are not that dumb and not that smart." What the company was smart enough to do was to recognize that they were more than a soft drink to those who consumed the beverage as well as to those who did not. What they were to seemingly the entire nation, regardless of individual beverage preference, was a piece of America as genuine and identifiable with the country as the game of baseball.

As a beverage the consumption of Coca-Cola has a rather limited physical impact. The drink was able to quench the thirst and to provide a small lift due to its caffeine and sugar content. Beyond its use, however, Coca-Cola was, as Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper editor William Allen White once remarked, the "sublimated essence of all that America stands for…." Though the formula underwent changes and the company developed diet, caffeine free, and cherry-flavored versions, what Coca-Cola represents has not changed. Coca-Cola, a beverage consumed by presidents, monarchs, and consumers the world over has remained above all else a symbol of America and its way of life.

—Jason Chambers