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Pepsi (Pepsi-Cola) is a carbonated soft drink, and principal rival of Coca-Cola.
History
Pepsi was first made in New Bern, North Carolina, in the early 1890s, by pharmacist Caleb Bradham and was originally called "Brad's drink". It was made of carbonated water, sugar, vanilla, rare oils, pepsin and cola nuts. As Pepsi was initially intended to cure stomach pains, Bradham coined the name Pepsi from the condition dyspepsia. The name was trademarked on June 16, 1903.
Caleb Bradham, like many pharmacists at the turn of the century, had a soda fountain in his drugstore, where he served his customers refreshing drinks that he created himself. This is where Pepsi was first served.
After seventeen years of success Caleb Bradham lost Pepsi Cola. Believing that sugar prices would rise he gambled on the stock market. Sugar prices fell and Pepsi Cola went bankrupt in 1923.
In 1931, Pepsi Cola was bought by the Loft Candy Company Loft president, Charles G. Guth, who reformulated the popular soft drink.
In 1940, history was made when the first advertising jingle was broadcast nationally. The jingle was "Nickel Nickel" an advertisement for Pepsi Cola that referred to the price of Pepsi. "Nickel Nickel" became a hit record and was recorded in 55 languages.
It first achieved success by selling its drink in recycled beer bottles, which allowed it to sell larger bottles for lower cost than Coke. Pepsi thus became viewed as the soft drink of the lower classes. In the United States, Pepsi was viewed as the drink of blacks and in Canada it was viewed as the drink for the Quebecois, the francophones.
In the 1950s Pepsi poured great resources into trying to improve its image. It bought many televison ads and began its long tradition of employing celebrities to sell its product. It grew and became a serious rival of the Coca-Cola corporation, but was still firmly in second place.
In the 1960s, Pepsi originated the marketing strategy known as "The Pepsi Generation". This strategy was a constant repetitious advertising of Pepsi aimed at young people. It worked under the assumption that there are new consumers coming of age every day and if one stops marketing to the newest consumers, one will have a shrinking base of established consumers of one's product. With the aging of the baby boomer generation, the advertising of Pepsi changed into the drink that keeps your youth.
In 1964, Diet Pepsi was introduced.
In the early 1980s, Pepsi began a series of advertisements called the "Pepsi Challenge", in which it directly compared its product to that of Coca-Cola, showing that people preferred their product over the competitor's (and Coca-Cola's own research showed similar results). Coca-Cola, at that time, was suffering reduced sales, and made a mistake of its own in changing the formula for its product - the new formula to be called New Coke - possibly in response to the Pepsi Challenge. This period of fierce competition between the two companies became known as the cola wars.
In 1984, then pop phenom Michael Jackson signed a multi million-dollar endorsement deal which was also a cross-promotion of his and his brothers' "Victory" tour, which Pepsi sponsored. Two commercial spots were aired featuring the Jacksons dancing with a group of neighborhood kids, including a young Alfonso Ribiero, in a concert setting.
The year 1989 saw the rise of the "Madonna Controversy." Pepsi reportedly paid Madonna $5 million for a world-wide promotional campaign tied to her song "Like A Prayer". Pepsi however did not see her video for the song until after the campaign began and promptly pulled the Madonna Pepsi commericals due to her use of burning crosses and other controversial images in her video clip.
1998 became a year of introduction for the GeneratioNEXT campaign which pitched a futuristic view of the company to youth. Racer Jeff Gordon was used as a symbol for fast, young, and powerful. Pepsi is often the most common drink at sports events, such as Major League Baseball, as well as large, arena-sized concerts. During the fall of 1998, Pepsi introduced Pepsi ONE, followed by an ambitious advertising campaign with the main slogan of "just one calorie." The cola introduced the use of Sunett (Acesulfame potassium) and aspartame to attain one calorie.
The company teamed up with George Lucas's reintroduction of Star Wars to the big screen during the summer of 1999. Twenty-four characters from the Star Wars series were introduced as artwork on the cans over the summer, creating an emphasis for a collectible set. This created a huge market saturation for awareness of the movie as momentum built up. Its current (as of 2004) slogan is "Ask for more." Pepsi has also changed the labels on all Pepsis sold in Texas (where it is the third most popular soft drink, behind Dr Pepper), renaming the drink "Pepsi Sí," in a move hoping to attract a larger Latino demographic (which largely drinks Coke), in aims that they might "say yes to Pepsi."
Company information
Run by PepsiCo, the company also owns and operates Quaker Oats, Gatorade, Frito-Lay and Tropicana. PepsiCo is a much larger corporation than The Coca-Cola Company, even if Coke still outsells Pepsi in almost all areas of the world. It is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol PEP. The company it formed for its distribution and bottling business is the Pepsi Bottling Group, trading on the NYSE under the symbol PBG. They are both SIC 2080 (Beverage) companies.
Until 1997, it also owned Kentucky Fried Chicken, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell, but these fast-food restaurants were spun off into Tricon Global Restaurants, now Yum! Brands, Inc.
South Korean Coat of Arms looks similar to the Pepsi logo, but is unrelated to it.
One of the only areas of the world where Pepsi outsells Coke is the Canadian province of Quebec. Pepsi had long been the drink of Francophones and it continues to hold its dominance by relying on local Quebecois celebrities (essentially Claude Meunier, of La Petite Vie fame) to sell its product. Pepsi eventually became an offensive term, nickname, for Francophones viewed as a lower class by Anglophones in the middle of the 20th century. The term is now used as historical reference to French-English animosity. Another region where Pepsi outsells Coke is in central Appalachia in the USA.
Spokespersons
As with many soft drinks, Pepsi has had various celebrity spokespersons throughout its existence. Among them:
Criticisms of the Pepsi-Cola product
Suspected adverse long-term health effects of phosporic acid
Some nutritionists assert that the phosphoric acid component of Pepsi-Cola and other similar soft drinks, may be deleterious to bone health in both men and women.
For more, see phosphoric acid in food.
Sugar
An excess intake of sugar has been suspected as a contributory factor in certain kinds of diabetes, often co-associated with obesity, to which excess caloric intake (relative to caloric expenditure from exercise) is suspected as a primary factor.
Accusations made against Pepsi
Coca-Cola was banned from import in India in 1970 for having refused to release the list of its ingredients. In 1993, the ban was lifted, with Pepsi arriving on the market shortly afterwards. One study led by the Center for Science and the Environment (CSE), an independent laboratory in New Delhi, found that the soft drinks contained residues of dangerous pesticides, with one dose 36 times greater than the European standard for Pepsi, and 30 times greater for Coca-Cola. The presence of these products could provoke cancers, negatively affect the nervous and immune systems, and cause birth defects. No law bans the presence of pesticides in drinks in India.
In response to the news, numerous Indians burned bottles of these two brands of soft drinks in the streets. The Indian government asked for a comparable study of soft drink bottles destined for markets in the United States.
Spin-off restaurants
Former CEOs of Pepsi
List of soft drinks produced by PepsiCo
Juices & juice drinks
- Dole: Drink to Your Health
- Dole Smoothers
- Hawaiian Punch
- SoBe
- SoBe Synergy: includes Fruit Punch, Grape, Kiwi Strawberry, Lemonade, Mango Orange
- Sunny Delight: The Power of the Sun, goes under the full name of "Sunny Delight Enriched Citrus Beverage", includes Tropical Punch Caribbean Style, Smooth California Style, and the Tangy Original Florida Style. Also available are Mango Style and Sunny D with Calcium. "Sunny D" is produced by PepsiCo for Proctor and Gamble.
- Tropicana Juice Drinks\
Sport nutrition and energy
Waters
Discontinued lines
- FruitWorks: Flavors were Strawberry Melon, Peach Papaya, Tangerine Citrus, Apple Raspberry, and Pink Lemonade. Two other flavours, Passion Orange and Guava Berry, were available in Hawaii only.
- Mountain Dew varieties
- Mug Cream Soda: Creamy Smooth Delight Without The Caffeine
- Pepsi Holiday Spice: Offered during the 2004 holiday season, this limited edition flavour/blend included nutmeg, etc.
- Squirt: including Diet Squirt and Ruby Red Squirt
- Crystal Pepsi: produced during the years 1992-1993
- Josta: launched 1995, "with Guarana"
- Kona: launched 1997
- Mazagran: launched 1995
- Pepsi XL: launched 1995, EXcellent Taste....50% Less Sugar Than Regular Cola
- Smooth Moos: launched 1995
- Storm: launched March 15, 1998, replaced by Sierra Mist.
- Matika: Run in August of 200?, it was a tea/juice alternative beverage, sweetened with Cane Sugar & containing Ginseng. Dragonfruit Potion, Magic Mombin, Mythical Mango, Rising Starfruit, Skyhigh Berry
External link
de:Pepsi
es:Pepsi
el:Pepsico
fr:Pepsi Cola
ja:ペプシ・コーラ
pl:Pepsi-Cola
sv:Pepsi-Cola
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