The Cola Wars

It’s as ubiquitous as running water and even electricity. You can find these sugary soft drinks all around the globe, from coast to coast, and even out in space. This bitter battle to see who has the best beverage has baffled billions. We’ll unmask these marketing machines and their quest to quench our thirst, and maintain market share, as we contemplate the cola wars on today's FYI.

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Transcript

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it's as ubiquitous as running water and even electricity you can find these sugary soft drinks all around the globe from coast to coast and even in outer space this bitter battle to see who has the best beverage has baffled billions we'll unmask these marketing machines and their quest to quench our thirst and maintain market share as we contemplate the cola wars on today's f y welcome to for your info english you got it[Music][Applause][Music] so[Music] hello hello hello my amigos and welcome to another exciting edition of f y i the show where we look at a bunch of different topics and we learn english as well as interesting things about these topics remember guys if you have any suggestions about future topics i'm always open and as we always say i'm all ears i think you say the same thing in spanish so that's an easy one for you guys to remember well if you haven't noticed yet today we're going to be talking about soft drinks you call them refrescos we call them soft drinks kind of makes sense because when we talk about vodka or rum or any of these this is called hard liquor so it only makes sense that something without alcohol is called a soft drink but as we'll find out not all soft drinks started without alcohol in them in fact in fact many of them had alcohol in them and other class a drugs as we call them or narcotics so we're going to take a look at that and the interesting origins but first let's take a look at our intro as you always know i'm always putting different words in there just to teach you words expressions and of course i like to add a little alliteration oh there i go again add anyad alliteration i started off by saying it's as ubiquitous now something that is ubiquitous is everywhere i said it's as ubiquitous as running water and now running water is what comes out of your faucet in your kitchen sink and even electricity and obviously electricity is what comes out of the plugs in the wall well actually the sockets remember this the plug is the part that you stick in and the socket is where the holes are then i said you can find these sugary soft drinks all around the globe let's look at that word sugar it's an interesting word because well it doesn't have an sh in it but we pronounce it as if there were an sh in it so we don't say sugar we say sugar sugar and obviously something that has a lot of sugar in it is sugary so you can find these sugary soft drinks all around the globe the globe is another way to say the world from coast to coast de costa acosta and even in outer space and outer space is el espacio remember in english as you guys remember if you listen to the nasa episode we don't say the space we say space if you haven't listened to that episode go back and give it a listen remember there are tons of episodes i think 35 episodes now if i'm not mistaken i lost track then i said this bitter battle there i go with my alliteration now this word bitter i'm sure you're familiar with especially those of you who live in spain bitter cass aha what does it taste like yeah it tastes bitter amargo so this bitter battle pattaya to see who has the best beverage now beverage is another way we say something to drink has baffled billions let's look at this word to baffle to baffle is to surprise b-a-f-f-l-e well with it with an e-d at the end baffled it has baffled billions and be aware said constitues that in english in american english a billion is you know then i said we will unmask to unmask is to uncover these marketing machines and there's another word that has an sh sound although there's a ch in it we don't say machine we say machine so these marketing machines and their quest this is one of my favorite words in the english language their quest is sukhruthada to quench our thirst and the word quench is satyar in fact if uh i think about gatorade one of their slogans was the thirst quencher el satya right and remember we don't say in english i have thirst si no i'm thirsty tengo said i'm thirsty so their quest to quench our thirst and maintain market share now obviously this has been the battle that's been going on for years who has more market share quintine del mercado and then i said we will contemplate equal espanol the cola wars on today's fyi yeah it's pretty crazy right that they call them the cola wars but uh i'm convinced it's not a war about who's got the better soft drink coke or pepsi but who's got the better marketing team who sells their beverage the best so first we need to set the scene it's the 1880s and there was no fda now what does fda stand for well the fda is in the united states the ones who regulate food and drugs so fda stands for the food and drug administration so now before any food or medicine comes to the market well of course it'll have to pass it'll have to be approved by the fda but back then there was no fda it was a free-for-all a free-for-all escape in fact a lot of these beverages that people were inventing they were kind of like tonics they were kind of like medicines that advertised everything from getting rid of headaches stomachaches anxiety and as we say people were selling snake oil and snake oil this idea of selling snake oil is selling something that's fake that's not really going to help you something that we even see nowadays misleading advertising misleading in este caso es enganoso so we've got to start at the beginning and okay it's been a bitter battle from the beginning but the first one on the scene was coca-cola that's right if it's a matter of who's older coca-cola wins but as we all know from the playground el patio that's a very logical word well it's not always who's older as we said before it's who's more popular translation who has more market share who's making more money right these are companies and they need to make a profit beneficial so coca-cola was invented in the late 19th century by a pharmacist named john stith pemberton john stiff pemberton and this guy well he founded this tonic this formula that was supposed to make you feel better it was supposed to give you a little extra energy take away your pain like a painkiller ana jessica but it wasn't called coca-cola at that time it was called pemberton's french wine coca and this guy he was a colonel john pemberton he was a confederate colonel in the confederate army and he was wounded wounded es eddido in the american civil war and well as many people he got hooked on morphine to get hooked on or to get addicted to as in gancharse and so uh he needed to find a substitute i guess it would be like the equivalent today of somebody who is hooked on heroin uh taking methadone so he started experimenting he started to tinker this is a great word that means also to experiment to try different things and in 1885 he came up with this thing that he registered called pemberton's french wine coca it was a nerve tonic it was something that relaxed your nerves and when we look at the ingredients you'll see why now this original drink the ingredients in this original drinks this original drink excuse me pemberton's french wine coca was wine bino cocaine yeah that's right and caffeine so i guess you could say it had a lot of kick sotos punch nosotros de timos that's interesting well the idea is the same but in 1886 well our friend pemberton had to start tinkering again because there was something called temperance legislation which was it had to do with prohibition and well alcohol became illegal so he had to find something to substitute he couldn't sell it not because of the cocaine the alcohol was the problem just imagine now this tonic that he was selling it made a lot of health claims uh they said that it was a valuable brain tonic that it would cure headaches as i said before relieve exhaustion calm your nerves i mean they didn't uh they didn't advertise it as a soft drink as something that would just you know give you a little more energy until later on but it had all of these claims i mean think about it if something could do that calm your nerves take away who doesn't want to drink this you know other words that they use they're good adjectives other words that they used to describe this new tonic was delicious refreshing pure joy exhilarating invigorating these are some good adjectives but don't forget we're still talking about a product that is called pemberton's french wine coca it wasn't called coca-cola yet and well where did it get the name coca-cola from a guy named frank mason robinson he was the bookkeeper or accountant right this is how we say el contable and well back in the day accountants had to have good handwriting so he came up with this name coca-cola and he used what's called this this spencerian script and that's the same logo that we still see today so we could say that uh pemberton was instrumental in creating coca-cola but frank mason robinson he's the one that came up with the logo and the name and in the bonus part of today's show we're gonna take a look at a spanish product that's right a spanish drink that preceded pemberton's french wine coca and if you guys want access to that the bonus part of the show as well as pdfs with all the vocabulary and weekly and monthly classes with me you can join us go over to patreon.com alberto alonso and you can find out about all the different options from bonus audio to pdfs and worksheets to classes with me it's all available at patreon.com alberto alonso and while we're at it i want to send a shout out to all my patrons including my super duper students hugo roberto jorge jose maria mila deside alex patricio edgar and lolis and don't forget about my interstellar students diego carmen pilar and diana thank you so much to all of you for making this show possible so you know now kids you know we don't give our kids coca-cola or pepsi because of the caffeine but just imagine back then it had alcohol in it cocaine and well whatever other ingredients would make you feel quote unquote better then our friend colonel john pemberton coronel we say colonel colonel john pemberton well he wasn't the greatest businessman in the world you know he he wasn't into business too much they say and so he sold the business and he sold it to somebody named asa candler asa candler another atlanta pharmacist and you know how much he sold the business for he sold it for 1750. now if we adjust that to inflation that's the equivalent of forty seven thousand two hundred and thirty dollars in 2020 money but even though pemberton sold the business he had a hunch a hunches una corazonada that his formula would and i quote someday be a national drink and oh boy he was right and you know he wanted to leave the business to his son uh i think you say legate he wanted to leave it to his son but his son was not interested in business his son just wanted money so as i said they sold it to asa candler and asa candler was one of these people who decided that he wanted to make money he wanted to make this product worldwide and why because he tried it he suffered from chronic headaches and he claimed that out of all the different products that he tried it was the only one that cured his headaches so he said i'm gonna buy it and i'm gonna make this huge and of course he tweaked it a little bit to tweak his affair by tweaking it he added some extra sugar some citric acid and he removed most of the cocaine so there was just traces of cocaine in it and of course as we said there was no alcohol in it yet and uh at this time now when we think about coca-cola a lot of times we think about cans lattas or bottles of coca-cola or two-liter bottles you know we think of the the fact that it's canned and bottled but at this time there were no cans and bottles at least not soft drinks uh they sold syrup their business was selling syrup because at that time they used soda fountains and a soda fountain is literally this big ornate thing that's on a bar and it would mix the carbonated water with the syrup so their business was selling syrup they weren't distributing like now we know one of uh coca-cola and pepsi's biggest business is bottling distribution it's not about the syrup or or also advertising and sponsoring other brands and we're going to get into all that a little bit later and in the bonus part we're also going to talk about that famous coca-cola bottle that's still around today that you know as i say even a blind person could pick up a bottle of coca-cola and know that it was coca-cola because of its distinctive features and let's be honest the bottle is sexy it's got curves it's cool and it's part of the brand okay so we've got some of the basics of coca-cola but when did pepsi come onto the scene well pepsi was originally created and developed in 1893 by somebody called caleb bradham caleb bradham and he introduced it as brad's drink so just remember this coca-cola and pepsi were not called coke and pepsi when they came out they both had different names now pepsi was as i just said brad's drink because his last name was brad ham and it was renamed pepsi cola in 1898 in 1961 they shortened it to pepsi and it kind of makes sense because they claim that it was good for your stomach and if you know anything about stomach acid well one of the the stomach acids or one of the juices in our stomach is called pepsin now the original drink didn't contain any pepsin but well it looked good and remember it's not about what's in it it's about how you market it at least that's one thing i learned when i was preparing this episode and another thing that's interesting is pep is another way to say energy so if you drank pepsi it gave you a lot of pep i always think of uh at high school we used to have these pep rallies estas charlas de come on we can do this let's go a pep rally or something a coach gives you you know during a baseball game or a basketball game or soccer the best example i can think of is pep guardiola pep guardiola loves to give his players a pep talk una charla energetica motivadora now the good thing about pepsi contrary to coca-cola was that pepsi was an instant success it was an overnight success i mean it was a bit more sugary than coca-cola and people were already into these kind of colas in fact there were so many others that either went out of business or were bought by coke or pepsi but there was a lot of competition but brad's drink pepsi it was successful from the first moment but that success didn't last long in in the year 1923 the pepsi cola company went into bankruptcy and this was because of financial losses remember when there are wars involved there's something called rationing and sugar was one of the things that was rationed they could only use certain amounts and it was taxed as well and of course this affected pepsi cola tremendously but a guy named charles guth came along and he was the president of a candy shop a chain of candy shops called loft inc now i i'm not familiar with these candy shops i don't know if they're still in existence but this guy had soda fountains at his candy shops and he wanted uh a deal he wanted a special deal um from coca-cola and you know what they said sorry no dice we're not gonna give any discounts on our syrup that's the way it is we're coca-cola and take it or leave it so this angered our friend charles guth he goes wait but i'm i'm one of the biggest purchasers uh compradores i'm one of the biggest purchasers of your product you're not going to give me a discount and he was infuriated and so he decided to seek revenge i guess he was a scorpio like me and a bit vengeful bengati was vengeful and so he decided to buy the pepsi cola company as i said they were going through financial hardships at the time so he bought them and uh he tweaked the formula as as many did you know they wanted to get the right flavor so that people loved it and he put pepsi cola in all of his candy stores and that led to pepsi cola bouncing back bulbiendo now an interesting fact that i came across que topekon was that uh on three separate occasions so separate separate so on three separate occasions between the years of 1922 and 1933 the coca-cola company was offered the opportunity to buy or to purchase to look at the word we said before the pepsi cola company and they declined on every occasion they said no we're not interested so imagine that if they had purchased the company we wouldn't even be doing these podcasts right now on the cola wars because the war would have ended with coca-cola being the champ but no they weren't interested in buying pepsi i guess they liked the competition as we say in english competition brings out the best in me now we already talked about how wars affected sales uh because of rationing because well coca-cola in the second world war was uh basically coca-cola petitioned the government so that coca-cola was the official drink of the soldiers out in uh you know the second world war so in the end they were always trying to be sneaky for evil they were always trying to go behind each other's backs and all these events these global events affected both companies in different ways and some of them as i said almost didn't survive such as the great depression this is where pepsi gained popularity because what they did is they introduced a 12 ounce bottle this was in 1934 and at that time um coca-cola they were they were sticking to their plan they were sticking to their guns como es la espression no ivana cambiar nada and they said we sell only these bottles and this is the price and that's that will not pepsi pepsi decided that they were gonna sell their drinks for five cents for one nickel and at that time radio was very popular so they came up with a jingle una rafaga that said nickel nickel which was recorded by the toon twisters in 1940 and it was very very catchy and sure everybody was trying to save a buck because it was the great depression so all of a sudden the repented people realized wait we can get the same we can get double the amount of pepsi for the same price as coca-cola well i'll take the pepsi you know everybody was trying if i have three kids and i can get 12 ounces for 5 cents or six ounces for five cents which one am i going with obviously and coke they were very reluctant to change even though pepsi was starting to take over here to take over as como kojer control so they were reluctant reactios and so from the 30s to the late 50s pepsi just kept you know trying to catch up with coca-cola and they were they were doing a great job they realized the importance of advertising they had a slogan that said pepsi cola hits the spot and i wanted to look at that because that's a great expression if something hits the spot it hits is spot i hope these podcasts hit the spot and they use this slogan and radio of course you begin once the television came out well we started to see these companies battling that out on television with tv commercials and even product placement in movies pepsi was very clear with their marketing they knew that they wanted to get young people they wanted to sell this lifestyle as i always say these people aren't selling soft drinks they're selling a lifestyle they're selling a feeling and pepsi always at that at least at that point went for the younger crowd and that's when we started to see also when in movies you started to see what we call product placement where in back to the future michael j fox's character mcfly would be drinking a pepsi or in home alone or or many other movies where pepsi and coke well decided well we're going to get our product in there and this way millions of people will be seeing their favorite celebrities drinking our soft drink and then i think coca-cola realized how important it was to reach young people and then they had that famous commercial i'd like to teach the world to sing i mean they had a re-issue of the commercial a few years ago and this commercial really really hit home people really identified with it it was about coming together it was about love it was about sharing and this battle was raging on and it still rages on today that's why they call them the cola wars and there's a lot of money at stake in huego and as you know now coke doesn't just sell coca-cola they sell sprite they sell so many other products pepsi as well they own frito-lay the company frito-lay so they all started to diversify sell different products work with different companies buy different companies and they had loyalty programs uh pepsi came up with this pepsi points which would if you drank pepsi where you could win different prizes as we call them loyalty programs and you know what this this war as i said continues to rage on today they are constantly trying to one-up each other and to one up somebody is mejorarles superarlis and this feud foreign this feud continues to this day and i've got to say something as somebody who doesn't really drink soft drinks i'm i think it's interesting for even people who don't study marketing just to read the story of how these two companies became juggernauts and a juggernaut this is an excellent word juggernaut in word reference a juggernaut is so these juggernauts continue to duke it out today and in the bonus part we're going to talk about that spanish drink that actually preceded coca-cola we'll talk more about bottling and how important bottling and distribution became and we'll talk about new coke was this coke's biggest blunder or was it brilliant marketing all that and much more in the bonus part of today's[Music] fyi you