Pepsi and Coke Advertising Efforts Cause Concern

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Pepsi and Coke Advertising Efforts Cause Concern
Soda Pop-Off
The Coca-Cola Effect
Everyone has a preference between Coke and Pepsi, right?
Sure, but it may not have anything to do with TASTE.
Perhaps the two most recognized brand names in the world,
these soda giants — besides the fact that they both crank out
an overpriced product that can make you fat, diabetic, and
toothless — have one other thing in common: Massive
amounts of advertising. Of course, this is WHY they're likely
the two most recognized brands in the world.
And according to some recent research conducted by Baylor
College of Medicine, this fact (the branding) is more relevant
to some people's preference for one of these soda giants over
the other than is the product's taste! Evaluating the cola
preferences of 67 volunteers of various cultural backgrounds,
the study's researchers found that:
* In blind taste tests, not all subjects preferred the
product they'd previously claimed on a survey to like
best. (Ironic, since the ultra-successful "Pepsi
Challenge" ad campaign was based on the idea that
only a cola's taste matters.)
* Labeling cups either "Coke" or "Pepsi" had a
profound influence on the subject's preference for
what they were drinking — regardless of which
product was actually in the cup they were sipping
from.
* Subjects showed the Coke logo immediately before
being given an unidentified soda to sip during a brain
scan exhibited stronger activity in that part of the
brain dealing with preferences than in subjects not
shown the logo.
Great, so people are susceptible to advertising. Whoopee.
What's this have to do with anything I normally talk about,
you're asking? Only this: Drug companies capitalize on this
same phenomenon of preferences based on branding, not
results, to peddle their poisons on prime-time TV every night.
They're spending hundreds of millions of dollars to create
desire for their products that's based on the appeal of slick
ads instead of concrete results.
That's why they all have catchy names instead of just their
chemical symbols — so that people will identify with the
benefits these names imply, and ask their doctors about them.
Think about it: What does the name Viagra make you think
of? A raging torrent of virility, right? Sure beats sildenafil
citrate. The same goes for high-profile drugs like Levitra,
Flonase, Celebrex, and on and on and on. It's all about
branding — what I call the "Coca-Cola Effect."
A fitting term, I think, seeing as how that most successful
cola brand in the universe gets its name from the euphoria
produced by a drug (cocaine) that used to be in it.
But this is not ALL that's new on the soda front...
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Drink your turkey and gravy!
Call me two-dimensional, but I figured there were basically
only two major types of soda-pop: Cola-types and clear-
types. Just about everything out there — Coke and Cherry
Coke, Pepsi, RC, Dr. Pepper, Mountain Dew, Sprite, Fresca,
even ginger ale and cream soda — is a variation on these two
themes.
But I was wrong...
According to a recent Associated Press article, a Seattle firm
called the Jones Soda Company is pushing pop in bizarre
new directions that defy all logic and reason — except that
which serves the bottom line. With such flavors as Turkey
and Gravy, Green Bean Casserole, Mashed Potato, Fruitcake,
and the semi-normal Cranberry, Jones has taken the soda
world by storm, growing from a small operation in the late
1980s serving the skateboarding, skiing, and surfing crowd to
a mega-successful brand sold in Target, Albertson's and
Safeway stores.
How on Earth is this possible, you're asking? According to
the article, one Cornell University nutritional sciences
professor chalks it up to humans' natural tendency toward
omnivorous-ness, but concedes that both the novelty aspect
and the bravado factor may also play a role.
I tend to think it's these latter two points that are driving
sales.
However, I always say: "Don't knock it 'til you've tried it"
(about most things, that is). Besides, unlike their clear or cola
competition, these sodas have no calories or carbohydrates
whatsoever. And at least they remind you of some healthy
foods instead of a bag of refined sugar.
Perhaps I'll try "Turkey and Gravy" with my next cigar.

Always popping off about what's pulling the wool over our
eyes,
William Campbell Douglass II, MD
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