Hi
this is an extract from an article of a DJ analyst
Jim Murphy ...
"Not so long gone, but apparently gone nonetheless, at least in the
U.S., is Pepsi Blue, the "cola berry fusion" introduced by PepsiCo in
the summer of 2002 with high-apple-pie-in-the-sky hopes.
In August 2002, the company wrote in a press release: "Pepsi Blue is
the latest of a series of successful soft drink innovations from Pepsi
Cola North America ... Nine months in the making. Pepsi Blue was
teenagers' choice of more than 100 cola fusion concepts tested." Not
no more it isn't. For months, every now and then, I've been rooting
around in news archives and on the Internet to see if PepsiCo had
thrown in the towel on Pepsi Blue. Ruthie and I tried it when it
first came out, and dreadful doesn't begin to describe it. I'm not too
tuned in to the thinking of teenager, but I also don't believe that
Pepsi Blue's resemblance to Windex helped sales either. There also
was unconfirmed gossip circulating on the 'Net that ingestion of Pepsi
Blue caused evident eliminatory changes best left to professional
gastroenterology journals to chronicle. A couple of weeks ago, after
having been remiss for two or three months in my quest to find out
whether Pepsi Blue was still on the market, I performed some Google
searches. I found one person's blog (Web log) that said the company
had withdrawn Pepsi Blue from U.S. shelves in November of 2003.
As proof that the company had discontinued the blue beverage, another
blog directed me to Pepsi Blue's Web site at pepsiblue.com. There,
instead of Pepsi Blue, I was greeted by an animated tall glass of
regular Pepsi being embraced by an uncoiled fry from a bowl of curly
fries beneath the asinine new ad slogan for regular and diet Pepsi,
"It's the cola." Isn't that just typical of corporate America? Pepsi
spends millions on advertising to tout Pepsi Blue, and alleges that
teenagers chose it from 100-plus other fusion colas, then never
bothers to let us know it bombed. It might not be a material
disclosure anyhow. I recall a beverage analyst telling me when the
stuff came out, and I had written disparagingly of its prospects, that
even failed colas can make money for such giants as PepsiCo and the
Coca-Cola Co. That's mostly because, he said, millions and millions of
people will be curious enough to try the new colas when they come out,
and that, in itself, will furnish a profitable jolt to the company's
business. Do you remember Crystal Pepsi? ..." |
