Cola Wars
...’s brand image had slowly become part of the American culture, especially since it was around since 1886. This led Pepsi advertisers to work harder in building a respectable image and catchy slogans. While Coca-Cola was trying to sell with “Coke Adds Life,” Pepsi fought back with “Have a Pepsi Day.” No matter how hard they tried to overcome each other, their marketing strategies were still similar. They both relied on colorful images, lively words, beautiful people, interesting bottle designs, contagious jingles, and targeted the American and international mainstream. However their advertising methods took different paths as Coke’s slogans focused on solely advertising the product, and Pepsi focused on the users of the product. Pepsi foresaw the mass appeal of the youth generation for soft drinks and in 1961 came up with the successful slogan, “Now, It’s Pepsi, for Those Who Think Young.” The campaign was such a success that Pepsi’s sales growth beat Coca-Cola’s. Throughout the years the two corporations were and continue to be, at each other’s throats. When Pepsi introduced the Pepsi Challenge in its campaigns, Coca-Cola immediately responded to the challenge by price discounting. Today, Pepsi and Coke are advertising aggressively more than ever, but instead of trying to be dominant in the same categories, they try to bring in revenue from different sources. Coke generates 71% of its revenues in international markets, while PepsiCo derives 71% of its revenues from the U.S. Coke earns more than 80% of its income abroad and PepsiCo earns over 80% at home. All of Coke’s profits come from beverages, while PepsiCo is the number one snack food industry internationally. However Coke still manages to be twice as profitable as PepsiCo and is the world’s third-largest corporate employer, after General Motors and Wal-Mart. Although Coke is the number one beverage company, Pepsi has been fighting back and its growth has accelerated lately. Aquafina is currently the number one bottled water in the U.S., while Coca-Cola is the country’s number two selling water. Both compani...