The Cola Wars

 

Like the ancient Huns, we Americans are a war-like people. We make war on everything, from the Global War on Terror to the War on Drugs. You name the problem, and we’ll start a war on it. Maybe it’s our love affair with guns or something in our water. Many Americans treasure gun ownership more than they do the right of children to be educated in an environment where they’re not in danger of being shot. We Americans do love us some war; we even tried waging war on poverty.

We even have war over soft drinks, or actually war between soft drinks. Whoa, you say! A war between soft drinks, you’re kidding right? No, dear readers, I’m as serious as a train wreck. For over a hundred years the two iconic American soft drink companies, Coca Cola™ and Pepsi-Cola™ have been engaged in a head-to-head competition worldwide for the taste buds of consumers.

Coca Cola got its start in 1886 when a Civil War veteran in Columbus, Georgia, who was taking morphine for injuries suffered in the war became addicted and sought a safer alternative pain killer turned to the coca leaf. From the 1860s to the 1880s cocaine was a commonly used cure-all. kola nut extract, a stimulant, was added to the cocaine, along with sugar and other flavorings, and Coca Cola was born. Seven years later, a North Carolina inventor came up with a similar drink using kola extract and flavorings which was initially named Brad’s Drink, but by this time Coca Cola was so popular, in 1898, he changed the name to Pepsi-Cola, and the competition began.

This fierce competition wasn’t called the Cola Wars until the 1970s when the two giants of the soft drink industry went after each other in a big way with promotions, ad jabs at each other and the like. But by the 1970s they’d already been at each other’s throats for nearly a century. As of now, they’ve been at it longer than the 1337 – 1453 Hundred Years’ War between England and France. Some of the things these guys do are pretty unbelievable. When I served as a diplomat in Vietnam and Cambodia for instance, the golf clubs where I played either had contracts with Coke or Pepsi as their beverage supplier and couldn’t offer both. They can’t pull stunts like that in the U.S., but with worldwide sales there are a lot of places where they can.

The thing that makes this so funny is that except for sweetness—Pepsi tends to be a bit sweeter—it’s hard, for me at least, to tell the difference. Fact is, I like both company’s non-cola drinks, Coke’s Fanta and Pepsi’s Sprite, but the colas remind me of a worm medicine we had to take as kids. The only way I can stand either is when mixed with rum or bourbon. Of course, they never advertise them as mixers.

Anyway, I digress. My point from the beginning is the warlike nature of my fellow Americans. We’ve had our burger war between Burger King™ and Macdonald’s™ and coffee wars between Starbucks™ and Macdonald’s™.

I don’t know if any side has ever really won any of these wars. The War on Poverty, for example, was a total failure. We still have too many people who make less than minimum wage, and don’t get me started on the War on Drugs or the War on Terror. We still have both.

Will we ever evolve into a peace-loving people, people who live up to the words we use to beat other countries over the head, but ignore here at home? I certainly hope so. But just between you, me, and the gate post, I don’t think it’s ever gonna happen.

I just wonder what we’ll make war on next. –