99-Year-Old Formula Changed : It’s the New Coca-Cola, They Bubbled
With all the hoopla, secrecy and patriotic bunting hanging around, this could have been the unveiling of the stealth bomber.
A red carpet, bound with red plastic tape, led the way to the speakers’ dais. A marching band strutted about. Red and white banners draped fences topped with barbed wire. An American flag marked the backdrop. Pin-stripe-suited men watched nervously as the crowd grew.
Finally, in the hand of a robot (this is the 20th Century) came what everyone had waited for--a 5-inch-tall can bearing “the first, official, new taste of Coca-Cola!”
Well, almost.
Brian G. Dyson, president of Coca-Cola USA, had to put down another can of Coke to grab the official one from the mechanical courier. But that didn’t mar the moment at the bottling company’s Los Angeles headquarters--the cameras clicked, the crowd applauded, and the robot got off the last words:
“There you go, big guy.”
The New Real Thing
Let it be recorded that the new Coca-Cola, announced last week and the subject of television commercials and counter-commercials by virtually every soft-drink manufacturer, officially hit Los Angeles shortly before noon Friday.
Its success will be measured in coming weeks as the new Coca-Cola, reformulated after 99 years, makes its way to Southern California markets. The first cans bearing the new mix left Coca-Cola’s downtown plant in delivery trucks Friday. They could start appearing in local stores as early as today.
To some, new Coke tastes roughly like watered-down, slightly sweeter old Coke. But if the enthusiasm surrounding Friday’s formal unveiling catches on, success seems assured.
Most people on hand for the unveiling at the Coca-Cola facility on Central Avenue raved about the new mix and the attendant ceremony. Most of them, too, were Coca-Cola employees.
Rum and New Cola
There were some non-believers, including one cynic who cracked: “Put a little rum in it and it doesn’t matter what you’re drinking.”
Employee representatives sat at red-clothed tables topped by red-and-white Coke umbrellas. They ate what the emcee referred to as “the all-American lunch”--hot dogs, apple pie, ice cream, and new Coke, all free.
Loudspeakers blared forth the Coca-Cola anthems at decibel levels usually reserved for runways at Los Angeles International Airport.
Dyson told the crowd that the new Coke resulted from four years of testing. Not just “sip testing,” mind you, but 200,000 interviewees who were tested via the use of “double-triangular discrimination” blind tests.
And it is sweeter, he said, featuring a “very slight increase in the sweetener element.”
Easy to Spot
Customers are already purchasing the new Coke in Washington, D.C., Miami and Atlanta, Dyson said. Los Angeles residents will be able to pick the new Coke by looking for yellow “new taste” stickers and gold metal tops on old-style Coke cans while a new container is being designed.
Dyson and the crowd laughed at one question: What if it doesn’t work?
“Absolutely impossible,” was his response.
At the end of the ceremony, Bill Adams, president of Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Los Angeles, handed Dyson a red T-shirt commemorating his visit.
Thus cued, loudspeakers burst forth--”I’d like to buy the world a home and furnish it with love . . . .”
Red-and-white balloons were loosed from two massive bins and swirled skyward, although a few dozen of them momentarily snagged on the electrical lines along Central Avenue. A small plane flew overhead, towing a banner in red letters, naturally: “L.A. Loves the New Taste of Coke.” And hostesses handed out cans containing that new taste.
“We are very excited,” Adams said. “We’ve got great momentum.”
