An Analysis of Biggest Marketing Blunder – Cola - Cola Company
- Submitted by: renuka
- Views: 580
- Category: Science
- Date Submitted: 04/03/2014 11:34 PM
- Pages: 3
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In 1985, Coca Cola Company was responsible for one of the biggest blunders in marketing – New Coke. At that time, New Coke came out because of sweetness and people preferred it over all other beverages, including the competitor, Pepsi. The Coca Cola Company decided that it was time to change their formula - to make it sweeter like Pepsi. After months of working on the formula, doing the blind taste tests, research and changing their packaging, New Coke was introduced. The areas discussed include customer loyalty, marketing research, brand, product development failures and competitor pressure.
After New Coke was introduced in the market, the Coca Cola Company succeeded in capturing market shares for a short time (87 days) but faced many dissatisfied customers. These customers were dissatisfied because the taste was different from the old Coke. So they protested and demanded to bring in the old Coke. In addition, the customer surveys simply neglected to accurately capture consumer sentiment (Cook, 2002). ). There is also a big difference when a customer takes a “sip” instead of buying 350ml bottle of New Coke. Hence, one of the reasons for the loss of sales was that the firm failed to consider the needs, wants and demands of the loyal customers.
Another lesson, I learnt was that even though the marketing research was carried out properly since it was well planned research project (through surveys, taste tests, focus groups and feedback from loyal customers), but it was not properly analyzed and interpreted. For example, the framing of questions from the research yielded wrong results. Also, some researchers pointed out that this survey consisted of simple Yes/No questions and was not likely to reveal loyal customer’s deep feeling about Coke (Ross, 2005)
Furthermore, there was brand failure. The New Coke brand would have been successful if the marketing research had considered the views of loyal customers of the old brand and then would have targeted these loyal...
After New Coke was introduced in the market, the Coca Cola Company succeeded in capturing market shares for a short time (87 days) but faced many dissatisfied customers. These customers were dissatisfied because the taste was different from the old Coke. So they protested and demanded to bring in the old Coke. In addition, the customer surveys simply neglected to accurately capture consumer sentiment (Cook, 2002). ). There is also a big difference when a customer takes a “sip” instead of buying 350ml bottle of New Coke. Hence, one of the reasons for the loss of sales was that the firm failed to consider the needs, wants and demands of the loyal customers.
Another lesson, I learnt was that even though the marketing research was carried out properly since it was well planned research project (through surveys, taste tests, focus groups and feedback from loyal customers), but it was not properly analyzed and interpreted. For example, the framing of questions from the research yielded wrong results. Also, some researchers pointed out that this survey consisted of simple Yes/No questions and was not likely to reveal loyal customer’s deep feeling about Coke (Ross, 2005)
Furthermore, there was brand failure. The New Coke brand would have been successful if the marketing research had considered the views of loyal customers of the old brand and then would have targeted these loyal...