Posted on 11/05/2004 11:11:37 PM PST by woofie
Coca-Cola. It may be the real thing, but not all Coke is created equal.
In parts of Albuquerque's South Valley, where Spanish is a primary language and many residents are transplants from Mexico, Coke is the drink of choice. But not the stuff that comes from bottling plants in the United States.
Those consumers prefer Coke from Mexico, and they swear there is a marked difference between the two. Putting their money where their taste buds are, they gladly pay between $1.09 and $1.39 for a half-liter bottle of Coke imported from south of the border. For the same price, shoppers at the larger grocery chains can buy plastic 2-liter bottles of American Coke.
A spokesman for Atlanta, Ga.-based Coca-Cola Co., however, says there is no appreciable difference in taste because the Coke formula is the same from bottling plant to bottling plant and country to country.
Mexican Coke aficionados don't agree.
"It's just sweeter. It tastes better," says Jesus Castro, owner of El Harradero Carniceria on Isleta Boulevard. "Most of the people who come into this store, about 98 percent of them, are from Mexico, and this is what they like," he says, pointing to a cooler with half-liter bottles of Coca-Cola imported from Mexico.
Customers at El Harradero buy about five cases of Mexican Coke daily, each case containing 24 bottles.
One customer, Carla McBride, tried a Mexican Coke for the first time. "It's smoother," she says. "It's more like a drink from an old-fashioned soda fountain."
Over at Familia Mexicana Carniceria on Bridge Boulevard, owner Ron Baca says his customers tell him they prefer the Mexican Coke because "it reminds them of the old Cokes we used to buy when we were kids."
Mart Martin, spokesman for Coca-Cola in Atlanta, has heard the comparisons before but can't explain them easily.
"The only difference is that the sweetener used in Mexico is cane sugar, and the sweetener used in the U.S. is high-fructose corn syrup. Both sugars deliver the same sweetness, the same sweet taste. The formula, which has been a secret for more than 100 years, is the same."
High-fructose corn syrup, by the way, delivers more calories in the same amount of sweetness.
Baca says Mexican Coca-Cola outsells all other soft drinks combined about 10 to 1 at his store. He goes through about 10 cases a day.
"It just has a better flavor," says customer Lucila Saenz, who is from Ciudad Juárez. "American Coke just doesn't taste the same."
The Carniceria Chihuahua on West Central Avenue does not keep track of how much Mexican Coke it sells, but a cashier says the store orders eight to 10 cases for every two to three cases of American Coke. In fact, she says, Mexican Coke sells better than all other sodas combined.
Customer Andrea Marrufo's opinion is typical: "Mexican Coke is thicker and sweeter. I've bought all kinds of Coca-Cola, but the Mexican Coke just tastes better."
Taste is a very complex sense, says Martin, the Coke spokesman. Some of the taste differences in the two Cokes, whether imaginary or real, may be affected by such factors as the food consumed with the drink, the size of the glass, the amount of ice in the glass and the temperature of the beverage when it is served.
"We work very hard to deliver a consistent product, and around the world a Coke is a Coke is a Coke," Martin says.
He thinks the preference some have for Mexican Coke is more about nostalgia than anything else.
But he will never convince the Coca-Cola connoisseurs in the South Valley.
I eat lunch in Juarez about once a week..
Dos Cokas por favor I say in my horrid spanish.
Big glass bottles, cooled in chipped ice still made
in an ammonia ice plant...
The taste is simply amazing!
They're bottling in 8 oz bottles rt now, they're out of the 6.5s and 10s atm.
The difference in taste was enough to mostly put me off soft drinks. To me, the corn syrup taste was sweeter and diminished cane sugar Coke's relatively greater tartness.
Coke's marketing studies showed that a portion of the Coke customer base preferred the cane sugar taste, but most could not tell and some liked the corn syrup formulation, including drinkers of other beverages. Coke's management concluded that the net effect was a wash. Since every major soft drink brand was making the same switch, the cost differential was enough to override lingering marketing concerns about corn syrup taste. I suppose those who, like me, fell away from soft drinks entirely were not enough to make a difference.
END PRICE SUPPORTS NOW!!
We already lost the LifeSavers factory to god-forsaken Canada and Hershey's is the only big candy company left. Price Supports is killing our sweet tooth
H-E-B Central Market here in Houston carries Mexican Coca-Cola as well as a whole slew of Mexican sodas made with suger and they move quite a bit of these I've tried a few of them including the Mexican Coke and it seems to me that the sodas made with pure sugar simply have a sharper more distinct taste - I remember Jolt Cola from a few years ago was made with sugar and about twice the caffeine as Coca Cola Why is it that we refer to orange soda, grape soda, peach soda, strawberry soda, cherry soda, etc etc but we never use the term 'cola soda' - in sort of a generic sense to avoid any brand ID or favoritism?
Everytime I go to this taqueria here in Tyler, I always drink a medio litro Coke. That or some horchata. ;)
Thank you, I'll check that out. A cold Coke is one of life's pleasures, though nothing next to hearing all this liberal whining!!! :)
My company has an office in Mexico City and a Mexican Coca-Cola is always a highlight of my trips there. The CC folks truly are fools. They will do anything but improve a product to sell more of it. If they were to trim their annual advertising budget by 3% they could switch back to real cane sugar, el azucar, and send sales through the roof.
This is what "New Coke" was all about.
Yes, but hispanic gals are cute without the bad diet. Chubby or not, their bodies will settle where their mind is. And I say no more sweets.
Escaping the polluted environs of near East St. Louis for fishing trips in Indiana during the late 1960's have one flavor memory for me: getting an ice cold "real" Coke out of a family-owned store's porch cooler and popping it open with the attached "church key". Nothing cuts the smell of your smelly catch (Bluegills!) on the way back home like those sodas did.
***A spokesman for Atlanta, Ga.-based Coca-Cola Co., however, says there is no appreciable difference in taste because the Coke formula is the same from bottling plant to bottling plant and country to country. ***
This is not so. I would rather have an Okinawan coke or a Thai coke or a Mexican coke any day. They just have a beter flavor.
I'll take your word for it, I don't cruise the Valley. :)
Coke bump
Surely you've been to the edge on south braodway....Mom's K'n I Diner ? Ordered at least a quarter Travis ???
Stay safe !........:o)
Is there any danger of Montezuma's Revenge drinking soda made with Mexican water?
At Cost Plus/World Market stores they sell Virgil's in genuine metal mini-kegs, tap and all. I keep trying to convince myself that I want that much root beer, because it would be great to have.
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