Coca Cola

Coca Cola was created by Pharmacist Dr. John Styth Pemberton. He developed the formula for the famous soft drink in his backyard on May 8, 1886. Dr. Pemberton's bookkeeper, Frank Robinson, came up with the idea for the unique cursive logo that has been the trade mark ever since. On May 29, 1886 the very first ad appeared in the Atlanta Journal:

Coca-Cola. Delicious! Refreshing! Exhilarating! Invigorating! The New and Popular Soda Fountain Drink, containing the properties of the wonderful Coca plant and the famous Cola nuts. For sale by Willis Venable and Nunnally & Rawson.

Dr. Pemberton died shortly after this ad and sales plummeted. Robinson didn't want the business to fail and decided advertising was at fault- "people did not know what they were missing."

After the Coca Cola trademark had been patented, Asa G. Candler, an Atlanta businessman, purchased the rights to the product and formed the corporation, "The Coca-Cola Company." He began the push on Coca-Cola advertising by giving thousands of tickets away for free glasses of Coca- Cola, and advertising on outdoor posters, calendars, soda fountain urns, and wall murals and making Coke available everywhere. The invention of bottling in 1894 increased availability of the soft drink.

The company hired William D'Arcy in 1906 to head up advertising and he believed that advertising should show that Coca-Cola is a part of happy times in everyday life. This type of advertising was used for decades. One of the first newspaper ads showed a picture of Ty Cobb, a baseball star up at bat and said:

Something's bound to happenÐ'--nerves a tingleÐ'--head whizzing. Crack!! Good boy Ty!! Safe!! And then you shout yourself hoarse. When it's all over you're hot, thirsty and limp. A cold, snappy drink of Coca-Cola will put you back in the game- relieve the thirst and cool you off.

D'Arcy found this baseball ad to be a success because everyone loves baseball. He felt as though it affected the reader's senses which made him or her feel thirsty for a Coca-Cola. Other ads that appealed to the consumer's sense of pleasure in associations with Coke included an ideal American girl drinking Coke, business men drinking Coke aboard an American Pullman train car and young people enjoying Coke out on a boat ride. In 1929 Coca-Cola's most famous slogan, "The Pause That Refreshes" appeared in the Saturday Evening Post.

Shortly after the above slogan, the Great Depression hit America and the Stock Market crashed. However, Coca-Cola continued to stay with the ads that showed Ð''happy scenes of everyday life.' These ads helped people escape the realities of the depression and gave them hope that life would return to normal. Examples included a woman taking a break from gardening to refresh herself with a Coke, boys and girls in soda fountain ads and Artist Haddon Soundon's famous image of Santa Claus with a Coke on billboards. The people responded to these ads and Coca-Cola stayed profitable even during the depression.

World War II had a major effect on Coca-Cola's advertising decisions in the next few years. Their war time policy was "We will see that every man in uniform gets a bottle of Coca-Cola for five cents wherever he is and whatever it costs." The company wanted Coke to be a boost for morale and to promote patriotism. The ads replaced the boys and girls at the soda fountain with smiling soldiers. Another ad in 1943 urged people to buy war bonds and war stamps and still another showed two women allies enjoying the "pause that refreshes." Coca-Cola wanted to show that they were part of the American