Happiness is just a Coke away

First blog post of the new year, and first post after reemerging from finals and then break. It's been a good two months consisting of, among other things, quite a few papers, pleasure reading, movies, cuddling with my dog, and two trips: Lexington and Atlanta.

I had the pleasure of visiting the World of Coke with my friends Rachel, Taylor, and Joseph while in Atlanta. Druggist John Pemberton invented the formula for Coca-Cola in Atlanta in the 1880s, during the era of soda fountains. Pemberton wanted to create something unique that was unlike anything else in the soda market. Like soda fountains today, soda was served by combining a syrup with carbonated water ... pretty cheap ingredients. The key, of course, is marketing. Pemberton got a good publicist, and made some quality publicity decisions himself, ensuring that Coke retained a good reputation into the 20th century.

More than a museum devoted to a mix of syrup and water, the World of Coke is a museum devoted to advertising. All visitors see a silly movie (with no real point other than silliness) at the beginning of the visit and are then free to explore different aspects of the museum (a two-level lobby with about eight small rooms leading off of it) at their own pace. You can take a picture with the Coca Cola polar bear, watch another film (this time in 3D ... er, 4D, because it appeals to your other senses as well), listen to Coca Cola "success" stories about how Coke changed people's lives, learn about the bottling process, and watch Coca Cola ads, among other things. The whole tour culminates in the tasting room where you can taste more than 80 Coke products from around the world ... did you know that Coca Cola produces Smart Water and Odwalla? Neither did I. Coca Cola is also an official sponsor of the Olympic Games and has more than 50 Olympic pins. There is also a ridiculous amount of art devoted to Coke.

The point is, this advertising works, and Coke is completely honest about it. They say more than once on the tour that the success of their product has a lot to do with their marketing and much less to do with the product itself (though they do cite that it's success comes from universal design, universal quality, and universal availability). They are good at it. I'm really not much of a Coke fan myself, I prefer lighter sodas like Sprite (also a Coke product) but by the end of the tour I was ready to drink a whole class of the syrupy goodness. Luckily, there was plenty of Coke for me in the tasting room and they gave me a free Coke in a bottle on my way out.

My friends and I were joking for the rest of my visit that happiness was just a Coke away, but isn't that exactly what the consumer culture wants us to think? That's why we have advertising in the first place. Coke, and other companies, succeed because they can convince us that their product will bring us just a little more happiness than we had a minute before. It may not be lasting joy, but it's good for the moment.

The best part of the museum for me was being able to examine Coke's marketing strategies and figure out what it is about them that draws me to drink something that I don't even really like. The answer? I like the little animated penguins in the polar bear commercials. I also like that Coke commercials emphasize general happiness.

And never fear ... unless you live in Cuba or Myanmar, you'll always have Coke within reach.