Introducing New Coke Harvard Case Solution & Analysis

Question 03: What was the meaning strategy used by Pepsi? It was really a threat to Coca-Cola? How could Coca-Cola respond to promote itself against of Pepsi meanings?

As the case states, Pepsi was focused on the user aspect of the industry rather than enhancing or improving the quality of the product that it offered to its customers. Pepsi was on a completely different path as compared to that of Coca Cola. Coke was inclined towards product improvement, better taste and improved quality along with customer satisfaction. On the other hand, Pepsi adopted the strategy of placing itself as a “new generation” product or cola. Since, Coke was the market leader with massive difference; hence, Pepsi decided to target a specific demographic area within the market. Therefore, they decided to target the youth and younger generation of the United States market.

This was basically the meaning strategy of Pepsi, which made it to increase the overall profitability of the company and actually developed itself as a threat for Coke, which has been the market leader for quite a while. Pepsi geared up the sales revenue once they came up with the product line “new generation”. This made youngsters and baby boomers associate themselves to Pepsi because Coca Cola had been the preference and choice of old people for more than a hundred years. Therefore, the above discussed was the meaning strategy of Pepsi.

The ad campaign by Pepsi “new generation” was actually a threat for Coca Cola, which led to the introduction of the new coke by the company. The idea of Pepsi was to challenge the credibility and to attack the customer base of Coca Cola, which was a direct challenge to the world’s oldest and most highly consumed drink in the world, which was operating in the industry for a long time. It was because of this challenge and approach of Pepsi where the company constantly looked to improve the product and the brand that it eventually made Coca Cola realize and understand its lacking. With the constant threat of Pepsi, in reaction Coca Cola came up with a new product that was named as “New Coke”. It is a fact that Pepsi has always made Coca Cola to run for their money and improve every day to remain ahead.

Coca Cola was immensely challenged by Pepsi with their new ad campaign “new generation”. To actually negate the impact of the strategy adopted by Pepsi, Coca Cola introduced a new product “new coke”; however, the company should have researched the causes of the decline in sales.

As the case states, Coca Cola was going through the transition phase of leadership within the company, where the company had to look upon new leaders that can take the company forward. Coca Cola could have emphasized and strengthened its research department, which could have hired a pool of talented individuals, who could have brought in new ideas to increase the sales of the company. Another thing or strategy which Coca Cola could have adopted while confronting with Pepsi was that it should continued to focus on its brand strategy and should have reinforced the market share by investing on ad campaigns that Pepsi was doing quite rigorously.

Coke was slightly lazy in realizing the importance of advertising. Although, being the people’s choice Coca Cola could have easily withered the new generation idea of Pepsi. As the case states, Pepsi was way behind Coca Cola in terms of brand loyalty and customers were quite happy with the taste of Coca Cola. The only thing where Coca Cola was lacking was the advertising strategy, which was quite a remarkable effort of Pepsi where it gained all the support of United States consumers. Therefore, to actually promote itself against Pepsi, Coca Cola might have considered to bring in better ad campaigns and install more commissions to stores, which kept Coca Cola in their shelves. All these things were practical for the company as it was the number one cola brand in the United States industry.

Question 04: In your opinion, what is the main factor that led to the failure of New Coke?

There were various reasons, which actually accounted for the failure of the New Coke. Some of the reason that led to the failure of New Coke was the fact that when the company decided to launch new cokes so they never communicated the reason for this change to its brand loyal customers. The decision was taken in a rush by the company and they introduced it without brining in the need to do so. Along with this, another problem that accounted for the failure of this new coke product was the poor advertising campaign that was followed by the company. During its advertisement campaign, New Coke was entirely focused on the product rather than the brand; although the case states that Coca Cola has been renowned for its strong culture inclination and attachment with the heritage of the society. While launching the New Coke; the company neglected this element...............................

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