Coca-Cola announced on Wednesday that it gave the beloved brand a makeover and plans to introduce new fruit-flavoured versions of the soda.
The original Diet Coke will stay the same, but it will be joined by Diet Coke Ginger Lime, Diet Coke Feisty Cherry, Diet Coke Zesty Blood Orange and Diet Coke Twisted Mango.
It’s the latest in a series of shake-ups for the company. Last summer, it announced that it would eliminate Coke Zero, which sent fans into a despair. That beverage was replaced with Coke Zero Sugar, which had exactly the same ingredient list as Coke Zero’s, though the company says it tweaked the “blend of flavours.”
It’s a pretty transparent ploy to try to recapture some of the millennial market share that Coke has lost to such beverages as La Croix.
Diet Coke sales have slumped as people have gravitated toward flavoured fizzy waters, reports the Los Angeles Times.
And the rainbow-coloured slim cans – “So Instagrammable!” some executive surely thought – are branding that practically screams, “Young people, do not abandon our ‘hip’ product!”
For what it’s worth, even though the cans are skinny, they’re the same volume, 12 oz., as the regular cans – and regular cans are still available, too.
“We’re modernizing what has made Diet Coke so special for a new generation,” said Rafael Acevedo, Coca-Cola North America’s group director for Diet Coke, in company press materials. “Millennials are now thirstier than ever for adventures and new experiences, and we want to be right by their side.”
Will it work? The words “feisty cherry” make me, a millennial person, visibly cringe (and what is so twisted about those mangoes?).
