This past Friday marked the 25th Anniversary of the introduction of New COKE, probably the biggest corporate snafu in the history of American business.
No major corporation (with the possible exception of Ford) has ever so completely misread consumer taste and opinion, and at least the Edsel was offered in addition to – not instead of – the company's most popular product.
It seemed like a good idea at the time.
The story of New Coke is still taught in business schools, and not in a good way. Coca-Cola, anxious to fight off a challenge from Pepsi, had forgotten its fans' deep psychological connection with the brand. It hadn't asked them if they would mind if the 99-year-old Coke formula disappeared, resulting in the biggest marketing blunder of the century.
Within days, consumers were searching for and hoarding the old Coke. Protests broke out, callers lodged thousands of calls to Coca-Cola headquarters and protesting shoppers poured New Coke down gutters.
After three months, the company acknowledged its mistake. It reintroduced the "classic" formula, which remains the top-selling soft drink brand today. New Coke lingered on through the late 1990s, but the world had passed it by.
From the Coca-Cola company website, their spin on the debacle is:
“
Perhaps a more human assessment of consumers' loyalty to Coca-Cola had come in 1985. The Company startled the American public by announcing a new taste for Coke, the first change in the secret formula since Coca-Cola was created in 1886. The new taste was overwhelmingly preferred in taste tests, but all the testing and research could not measure the emotional attachment Americans had for the original formula. That original taste had become more than just a soft drink, and consumers' deep feelings, memories and loyalties to it came alive. The Company listened to its consumers and quickly responded by returning the original formula to the market as Coca-Cola classic®.”
I was one of those millions of Coke drinkers who did not like the taste of New Coke. It tasted slightly salty to me, and I thought the taste copied RC-Cola, a brand I would only drink of there was no Coke available and my only other choice was Pepsi. I can remember how skeptical I was when Coke Classic was introduced; was it really the original formula, or were they screwing with us again?
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