How Diet Coke Became the World's Liquid Crack of Choice

Jezebel.com ^ | AUG 8, 2012 1:30 PM | Katie J.M. Baker

[thecodont]

Diet Coke turns 30 this year, and despite health concerns and an rocky advertising trajectory (remember Paula Abdul dancing with dead celebrities?), the Thank-God-It's-Not-Sugar-But-Hopefully-Aspartame-Won't-Kill-You beverage is doing better than ever. Diet Coke has held the title of second most popular soda in the world (after regular Coke) for two years running — 40% of colas currently sold are either Diet Coke or Coke Zero — and it seems like more people are now drinking it for the taste instead of as a diet aid. But it wasn't always this way.

When Diet Coke was introduced in 1982, "it was too new to be cool," Zoe Williams recalls. "So it was very uncool not to drink it, but it wasn't totally cool to drink it either." While most people in the 80s were busy making horrible decisions regarding leg warmers and cocaine, the brand made headway with two genius moves. The first was buying Columbia Pictures as champions of product placement, guaranteeing that actors would be chugging Diet Coke for decades to come. Second, it differentiated itself from TaB, a title so associated with "diet" drinks that even literally putting Diet in its new moniker made the beverage more successful.

The brand has tried to experiment over the past decade with little success; the public knows what it wants, and it wants its Diet Coke. There was 2005's Coke Zero, which was practically the same as Diet Coke but meant to appeal to men who were too embarrassed to drink a sissy weight loss beverage like all those weight-obsessed ladies out there. Apparently, though, those men don't actually exist, because no one bought Coke Zero, despite its sleek packaging and uber-manly, throw-caution-to-the-wind "Enjoy everything" tagline. Oops.

[Venturer]

Make mine High Test.

Don’t want any diet crap.

[unlearner]

Diet Rite (the RC version of diet Coke) is called “pure zero” for zero calories, zero carbs, zero caffeine, and zero sodium. It also uses Splenda rather than Nutrasweet. Doesn’t taste as good as the Coke products to me, though. Jones sodas has a sugar-free and caffeine-free soda a lot like Cherry Coke that tastes better than the Diet Rite sodas.

[Disambiguator]

I used to be (still am) truly mystified by the relationship of women to Tab, it was puzzling.

It's in the same realm as the lesbian/Subaru thing.

[PJ-Comix]

Actually Birch Beer is the best. They used to sell it here in Florida at Royal Castle restaurants. They came in big FROSTY mugs. They were GREAT on hot days!

BTW, Royal Castle was probably the BEST fast food restaurant ever but, alas, they are no more.

[PJ-Comix]

The above is an earlier version of Royal Castle. The later design had large wall murals featuring pics of coffee beans, brewed coffee in a cup, eggs in the shells, fried eggs, and bacon. It made you not only want to eat breakfast there but also to EMBRACE breakfast. I remember taking a Greyhound bus home late one night from downtown Miami to north end of the county and the sights of those breakfast murals in the Royal Castles were quite enticing. Even though I was just a kid, just seeing all those coffee beans and coffee in cup was so enticing, that must have what started me off in the direction of becoming a caffeine addict.

I wish I could find one of those murals now or at least a pic of it to post. Basically it made it almost impossible to walk past a Royal Castle in the morning without having breakfast there. And what was great, there weren't a whole bunch of tacky signs with prices. Just that incredibly alluring mural.

[RC one]

If there was anything in DC that could kill you, I really ought to be dead. Your stomach acid is way more acidic than phosphoric acid btw. Furthermore, we asd citric acid to many different foods to affect their taste. I use it when making wine to produce a certain tartness for example along with (tartaric acid and malic acid). Citric acid is also a chelating agent, like phosphoric acid, and is known to be good for you. I probably wouldn’t ingest a concentrated form of any proton donor however.

[CH3CN]

Aspertame made me go deaf.

[reagan_fanatic]

Diet Coke is sweetened with aspartame; Coke Zero is sweetened with aspartame and acesulfame potassium. Using two sweeteners keeps the concentration of each below the threshold, where you notice any "chemical taste", or aftertaste. Apparently, I'm not the only one who notices the improvement.

Same here. I can't stand the taste of diet Coke, but I could drink Coke Zero all day long

Major taste improvement.

[11Bush]

LOL!

I enjoy any game that is open world. Nothing worse than being limited to a small trail that you must follow. Fallout, Skyrim, Oblivion, Badlands, etc. at least allow you to explore you environment and have some fun.

[Mears]

“Same here. I can’t stand the taste of diet Coke, but I could drink Coke Zero all day long”

—

I drink iced tap water all day long.

Cheap and healthy(at least in my area).

[11Bush]

BTW, Royal Castle was probably the BEST fast food restaurant ever but, alas, they are no more.

Hear, hear! Nothing better than half-dozen burgers and a Birch Beer! Made White Castle taste like cardboard patties.

[VeniVidiVici]

Can’t stand soda. Well, maybe original Pepsi on occasion.

Now, BEER on the other hand ...

[pops88]

I recently tried flavored seltzer as it was on sale and I happened to notice it. It was a “what the heck” moment. It has zero calories, too, but is sweetened with sucralose. I was surprised at how good it was. I gave up Diet Coke around 1990. A nurse I worked with kept getting headaches. They stopped when she quit drinking Diet Coke. I decided to err on the side of caution.

[patriot08]

I don’t need to lose weight, I just drink Diet Coke because I prefer the taste to regular coke.

[Drew68]

In Canada there’s a product called Pepsi Throwback that’s made with cane sugar. Regular Coke and Pepsi here are a mix of can sugar and corn syrup.

You can get throwback Pepsi here in the States as well as throwback Mt. Dew and Dr. Pepper. I think there was a run of throwback 7-Up as well. As the price of corn continues to rise to meet our federally mandated ethanol demands, I predict we'll see a return to the use of cane sugar as a sweetener. It's already happening with many products advertising "no HFCS" on their labels.

[Squawk 8888]

I think you’re right but it will probably happen in Canada first because of the protectionism for US sugar growers; the price of sugar in the USA is ~4x what we pay here, which is why most American soda producers switched to corn syrup in the first place.

[Squawk 8888]

All colas contain phosphoric acid.

[PJ-Comix]

Royal Castle also had a Florida ambiance. I can’t quite describe it but you FELT like you were in Florida when you were in a Royal Castle. We also had a White Castle nearby and it just didn’t have that Florida feeling. It felt like...an urban northern ambiance. Oddly, when my cousin visited from up north, he insisted on going to White Castle.

[Drew68]

why most American soda producers switched to corn syrup in the first place

Funny, the last time I was on deployment overseas (2007) our aircraft carrier received stores from various Arab countries. We'd get cases and cases of Arabic soda, American brands such as Coke, Pepsi, Mt. Dew, Dr. Pepper, etc. all familiar logos except they were written in Arabic. The younger sailors would complain that the sodas tasted funny. I told them "this is how they're supposed to taste!" as they were all sweetened with sugar. It seems that outside the United States (and, I guess Canada) sugar is still the primary commercial sweetener.

Oh, and Arabs drink Orange Fanta like it's water. I've never seen more Fanta in my life than I did in Arabia.

[peggybac]

Tab is NASTY. Even when diluted with rum, it still tasted terrible.