Cola Wars of the senses

Branding specialists like to talk about the ‘brand experience’. We like stories. We like adding new dimensions that competitors don’t have.

When the Cola World gets it right…

Singapore Airlines trademarked their smell, KFC trademarked their secret herbs and spices…now this. Coca-cola had been experimenting with the sounds of their product as blipverts in the Intrinsics campaign; 5 second ads with simply their logo and the sound of a Coke being opened or someone going ‘ahh’.

Now they’re using the sounds in order for the ‘Crave’ spot above – after all, if a jingle can be associated with a product and get stuck in your head, why not the sound a product makes?

When the Cola World is a bit off…

Last week the design pitch for Pepsi’s new logo was leaked; 27 pages involving the Mona Lisa, particle theory, feng shui, emoticons, and how these have contributed to Pepsi’s design identity.

Here’s my favorite…

Image: Gawker

Not that any of the document will have much of an effect on what the consumer sees, but here’s a case where the story might just have been taken too far…

(See the doc here courtesy of FastCompany)

For this round, I think Coca-Cola wins.