April 23, 1985: Coca-Cola throws the people a curveball. It turns out to be a wild pitch.
In the 1950s, Coca-Cola, or "Coke" for short, outsold Pepsi-Cola by a 5-1 ratio. Pepsi decided to embrace the rising post-World War II youth culture. In the late 1950s, Pepsi was "for those who think young." In the early 1960s, they advertised "the Pepsi Generation." The message was: "You like Coke? You're old, you're out of it. Get with it, be young, drink Pepsi." It worked, to a degree: Pepsi was still 2nd among colas behind Coke, but it was a considerably closer 2nd.
In the early 1980s, Pepsi began "The Pepsi Challenge," giving people blind taste tests, showing that they preferred Pepsi, and then showing these wins in their commercials. Many, many commercials. You couldn't get through a night of prime-time TV without seeing a Pepsi Challenge commercial.
"A Coke and a smile" wasn't cutting it anymore. Nor was the reworked slogan "Coke is it!" The famously top secret "formula" for Coca-Cola was still working, still Number 1, but Pepsi was getting closer and closer.
So Coke executives decided to get aggressive. They came up with a new formula that they thought people would like better than Coke or Pepsi. They put this new formula into 200,000 taste tests, and, sure enough, it beat Coke and Pepsi more often than not.
So, on April 23, 1985, "New Coke" was introduced. Except... Coca-Cola took the old Coke off the market completely. One of the most famous food brands on the planet, and they dropped it completely. You could no longer get Coke anywhere, only New Coke.
And it was a disaster. The reason old Coke was still Number 1 in the first place is that, for all the people switching to Pepsi in taste tests, people tend to be loyal to their old brands. It's why, while Coke's lemon-lime brand Sprite has remained popular, Pepsi's version has never really caught on, whether rebranded as Teem (introduced in 1959), Slice (1984) or Sierra Mist (1999). And 7-Up also remained a popular lemon-lime drink -- more popular than its "parent" drink, Dr. Pepper.
(UPDATE: In 2023, Pepsi updated its lemon-lime drink again, as Starry.)
In contrast, the main reason Coke was able to replace its diet drink Tab (introduced in 1963) with Diet Coke (1982) with great success is that Tab was never all that popular, anyway.
So the people who wanted to stick with old Coke felt like they were being slapped in the face. To them, it didn't matter how good New Coke was: They wanted their Coke.
And how good was New Coke? As it turned out, not that good. I was 15 years old, and I already preferred Pepsi, and I didn't think New Coke was even as good as the old one. Apparently, most people agreed with me -- on New Coke vs. old Coke, if not on either coke vs. Pepsi.
The scientists at Coca-Cola didn't realize that what works in a taste test might not work for an entire bottle or can of the stuff. They thought that Pepsi was "winning" because it was sweeter than Coke. So New Coke was made to be sweeter than either old Coke or Pepsi. And, for a sip or two, it worked. But for an entire drink, it was too sweet. Too much. Canada Dry had spent years advertising its ginger ale with the slogan, "It's not too sweet." New Coke was way too sweet. (Canada Dry is also now owned by the company that owns Dr. Pepper and 7 Up -- and also Snapple, and Keurig.)
And the funny thing is, the fiasco didn't help Pepsi all that much. People loyal to old Coke still weren't switching to Pepsi. Any gains that Pepsi made were attributed to the marketing campaign it was already doing.
And when Summer arrived, and sales of New Coke didn't go up with the temperatures, the writing was on the wall. And it was profane. On July 11, 1985, Coca-Cola brought the original back, under the name "Coca-Cola Classic" -- or "Classic Coke."
It has been alleged that the whole thing was a conspiracy to get people to miss the old Coke, so that, when it was brought back, people would buy more of it than ever before. If so, it didn't work: It sold only about as well as it had before the whole thing started.
Essentially, Coca-Cola was a victim of its own success: It had hit a ceiling. Anybody who wasn't already drinking it wasn't going to start. And Pepsi was never going to catch them. They, too, had hit a ceiling. The market had spoken, and had solidified.
After Classic Coke was brought back, New Coke hardly sold at all. It was rebranded as Coke II in 1990, and discontinued in 2002, having been bought by few, missed by fewer, and mourned by nearly no one.
But the "Cola Wars" continued, including with rock stars endorsing one brand or the other. Michael Jackson endorsed Pepsi, with his hair infamously catching on fire while shooting a commercial for it with his brothers. Ray Charles was signed to endorse Diet Pepsi, singing the catchphrase, "You got the right one, baby!" while his backup singers sang, "Uh-huh!" Elton John, Whitney Houston and Paul Abdul all did commercials for Diet Coke.
It got to the point where Neil Young, angry at how commercialized rock music had become, wrote a song titled "This Note's For You," the title a parody of Budweiser's slogan, "For all you do, this Bud's for you." The video showed a Jackson impersonator drinking a Pepsi, his hair catching fire, and a Houston impersonator dousing the flames by pouring a can of Diet Coke on his head. By 1989, Billy Joel who (through 2022) has never done a commercial for any product except his own concert tours, was willing to close his history-lesson song "We Didn't Start the Fire" with the words, "Rock and roller cola wars? I can't take it anymore!"
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April 23, 1985 was a Tuesday. Actress Rachel Skarsten was born on this day. She has appeared in 2 TV shows about superheroes: Birds of Prey, as the heroine Black Canary; and Batwoman, as the villainess Alice.
These Major League Baseball games were played:
* The New York Yankees lost to the Boston Red Sox, 5-4 at Yankee Stadium. Dave Righetti gave up a single to Marty Barrett, a sacrifice bunt to Jackie Gutierrez, and singles to Wade Boggs and Dwight Evans in the top of the 11th inning. Don Baylor hit a home run, Rickey Henderson went 1-for-6, and Dave Winfield and Don Mattingly each went 1-for-5, with Mattingly adding an RBI.
* The New York Mets lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, 8-3 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.
* The Montreal Expos beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-4 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal. Vance Law won it by drawing a bases-loaded walk off Charles Hudson in the bottom of the 10th inning, wasting one of the last good starts in the career of Steve Carlton, who got a hit in his own cause. Mike Schmidt went 2-for-4 with a walk.
* The Kansas City Royals beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 7-6 at Exhibition Stadium in Toronto. George Brett went 2-for-4 with a walk and 4 RBIs.
* The Chicago Cubs beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-0 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. Rick Sutcliffe pitched an 8-hit shutout and hit a home run.
* The Detroit Tigers beat the Cleveland Indians, 4-3 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 6-5 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. The Brewers scored in the top of the 10th inning, but the White Sox won it in the bottom of the 10th on a single by Oscar Gamble. Robin Yount went 2-for-4. Paul Molitor went 1-for-5.
* The Minnesota Twins beat the Seattle Mariners, 4-2 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.
* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Texas Rangers, 11-1 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. Eddie Murray went 2-for-5 with an RBI, and Cal Ripken went 2-for-5 with 2 RBIs.
* The Houston Astros beat the Cincinnati Reds, 6-4 at the Astrodome in Houston. Reds player-manager Pete Rose did not put himself into this game.
* The Atlanta Braves beat the San Diego Padres, 4-2 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. Tony Gwynn went 1-for-4.
* The Oakland Athletics beat the California Angels, 14-9 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Reggie Jackson hit his 505th and 506th career home runs. Rod Carew went 0-for-3 with 2 walks.
* And the San Francisco Giants beat their arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Dodgers, 2-1 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.
There were 4 games played in the NBA Playoffs:
* The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Boston Celtics, 105-98 at The Coliseum in the Cleveland suburb of Richfield, Ohio.
* The Denver Nuggets beat the San Antonio Spurs, 115-112 at the HemisFair Arena in San Antonio.
* The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Phoenix Suns, 119-103 at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix.
* And the Portland Trail Blazers beat the Dallas Mavericks, 122-109 at the Portland Memorial Coliseum.
And there were 4 games played in the Stanley Cup Playoffs:
* The New York Islanders lost to the Philadelphia Flyers, 5-3 at the Nassau Coliseum. The dynasty, and the days of the Coliseum being known as "Fort Neverlose," were over.
* The Quebec Nordiques beat their arch-rivals, the Montreal Canadiens, 7-6 at the Colisée de Québec. Dale Hunter scored with 1:24 left in the 1st overtime. Michel Goulet scored a hat trick for the Nords.
* The Chicago Black Hawks beat the Minnesota North Stars, 5-3 at the Metropolitan Sports Center in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.
* And the Edmonton Oilers beat the Winnipeg Jets, 5-4 at the Winnipeg Arena.
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