Pepsi

Coca-Cola had been the reference soft drink around the world for decades, but in the early 80s a very tough competitor had emerged: pepsi. The firm had been gaining more and more followers with advertisements in which they participated Michael Jackson, Michael J Fox either Cindy Crawfordand its success did not stop growing thanks to a spectacular advertising campaign called “The Pepsi Challenge”. Those ads seemed to show that people preferred the taste of Pepsi, and Coca-Cola managers, scared by the threat of being forgotten, decided to change the formula and create the so-called “New Coke.” That was a disaster and Coca-Cola ended up returning to its original formula. The Pepsi challenge was as simple as it was effective. The people who participated did a “blind tasting”: there were two glasses with unidentified cola, one with Coca-Cola and the other with Pepsi. In appearance they seemed the same, and behind them were the bottles with which each glass had been filled (or hidden under some paper cylinders). The result according to the advertisements was always himself. The taste of Pepsi won time and time again. Coca-Cola executives, who saw how their market share was constantly declining, began a gigantic project: the creation of a “New Coca-Cola” (New Coke) that would see its recipe modified for the first time since the creation of this drink in 1886. What happened The modification of the recipe was evaluated with market studies that were promising: the new Coca-Cola, sweeter, beat both the old Coca-Cola (the original) and Pepsi. Everything seemed to show that Coca-Cola had its winning drink. That made the company announce “New Coke” with great fanfare on April 23, 1985. Initially the reception was good, but criticism soon began to arrive, which increased: a lot of people wanted the old Coca-Colaand surveys conducted shortly after the launch showed how only 13% of people preferred “New Coke.” Coca-Cola ended up producing the original recipe again, which it called “Coca-Cola Classic” just two months after that launch, and some time later it directly stopped manufacturing its “New Coca-Cola” to stay with the classic, which also lost that adjective. Everything remained as at the beginning, but with a spectacular marketing failure and development in which the firm had invested 100 million dollars. Still, Coca-Cola recovered after the disaster. That attempt to compete, although a failure, seemed to resonate deeply with consumers, especially when Coca-Cola recognized its mistake and offered the “old Coca-Cola” again. By the end of 1985, Coca-Cola Classic was outselling New Coke and Pepsi. What happened? One of the problems was pointed out by Malcolm Gladwell in his book ‘Intuitive Intelligence: Why do we know the truth in two seconds?’ (‘Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking’). In it he explained how the failure was in the nature of the blind tastings, based on “sips.” People, he explained, reacted positively to the sweeter taste of Pepsi when they only tried a sip, but that taste ended up being worse when you drank an entire can, and that is what according to Gladwell Coca-Cola failed to understand in its tests. The original Coca-Cola recipe proposed a much more appropriate balance for the capacity of the cans and bottles of this soft drink. At Coca-Cola they also tried to investigate what had happened, and the conclusion of those in charge was that they underestimated the public reaction of people who rejected the change. The response generated by that launch of the “New Coca-Cola” was astonishing, and signature collections and movements against the new recipe were organized that united many people in an unprecedented campaign. Of course: New Coke kept winning those blind tastings. It didn’t matter: the one that really won was Coca-Cola, whose current quota in the soft drink market is 44% in the United States, while Pepsi’s is 26%. In Xataka | Odyssey in the soft drink aisle: why drinking a Diet Coke in the middle of 2026 is an impossible mission In Xataka | The Coca-Cola recipe seemed untouchable. Until Europe first and Mexico later have decided to touch it Image | Unsplash