Coca-Cola is a very disturbing brand

[snousle]

I just watched The Road, which is a fairly bleak post-apocalypse movie that is interesting in part because it is serious about how an apocalypse would actually play out. It doesn't even say what the causative disaster was, because that's not necessary; it's a story about people, not technology.

The plot and imagery does not disturb me per se; everyone ends up in the grave, this is just another way of getting there, and the filmmakers had the balls to serve it up straight without a "happy ending". What did disturb me, though, was one small scene that involved a Coca-Cola product placement.

The scene was almost identical in structure to another product placement, in a Chinese film whose name I cannot remember. In both cases, the sensual pleasure of the drink was being experienced for the (nearly) first time in a context of extreme deprivation, establishing a kind of psychological wormhole between the characters' harsh, cruel environment into our own luxurious and decadent one. And something about this makes us feel good about ourselves - not guilty, maybe not even grateful. The word that comes to mind is universal. The inherent goodness of Coca-Cola is established by these scenes as indisputable, with any contrary opinion becoming emotionally inaccessible. Our pre-existing values are validated and reenforced.

So far so good. What bothers me, though, is the impossibility of imagining any other soft drink in that role. Surely a Dr. Pepper would taste every bit as good, post-apocalypse, as a Coke. How is it that Coca-Cola has such an iron grip on this psychological technique? Why does it represent an authentic message from our own world, when other brands are not?

Imagine the film continuing with the boy getting sick; having never experienced the intense combination of sugar and acid, it might have made him puke violently. The cola might be an unwelcome, alien intrusion from a world that no longer suited their needs. How would that have played out? What emotions would that bring up? Would it have made the film better, or worse? Would it even have been possible to include such a scene without getting sued for brand defamation?

I get the feeling that there must be some academic theory that describes this emotional monopoly and identifies how it comes about. If I knew what it was, maybe it wouldn't be so disturbing. But it leaves me feeling like I'm in the grip of some kind of mind control, and makes me wonder where else I'm granting these subconscious allegiances.

I do not want my mind to be owned by a corporation.

Comments

[kevynjacobs.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I haven't seen The Road, but I get what you're saying.

This reminds me of another post-apocalyptic movie that used Coke product placement in such a blatant, nostalgic way: The Last Chase, a 1981 low-budget SF film starring Lee Majors. In it, the heroes have to drive through a makeshift road block: An abandoned Coca-Cola truck. I remember two of the characters discussing whether or not the cans of Coke in the truck was still drinkable, two decades after the truck had been abandoned on the road. One character tells the other, no, the Cokes were made before he was born and would be completely undrinkable by now. Again, the Coke was being used as a symbol of our bygone age.

[snousle.livejournal.com]

Very interesting that the Coke was "undrinkable". I wouldn't have expected that if it were a paid placement. Was there anything about the scene that made you feel positive or negative about the brand?

[kevynjacobs.livejournal.com]

Well it certainly felt nostalgic, like the characters were longing for something -- the Coke -- which they no longer could have. So in that sense it was positive...

[danthered.livejournal.com]

Mind control? You betchya. Many or most people will fervently insist they aren't swayed by advertising, and yet it remains a multibillion-dollar industry for one reason only: advertising works. You're hitting one of the primary reasons I don't watch TV and won't have one, but that certainly doesn't make the problem go away; these messages and inducements are absolutely not avoidable without living in a wholly disconnected remote shack à l'Unabomber. I think the reason why it works with Coke and not with another brand is nothing more or less than decades upon generations of brand equity. It becomes a rock, a (more or less) constant in a constantly-changing culture and world—a thought worth keeping track of while pondering Coke's 1985 experiment, probably deliberately ginned up, with a big change to the recipe and taste.

[come-to-think.livejournal.com]

I don't have any evidence, but I am somewhat skeptical about the extent to which it "works". There is foolishness in all walks of life, including even the promotion business, and as C. S. Lewis observed, a hard heart is no certain remedy for a soft head. I suspect that, in advertising, the smugness that arises from contempt for the customer is at least as powerful a motive as the lust for profit. True, there is market research that is supposed to check such things, but I gather that it is paid for by the same departments of businesses that provide the "services" it is supposed to check.

Certainly, the continual petty harrassment & insult of advertising & discounting are repulsive to me, and I avoid them as much as I can. I don't have a TV either, and I don't read newspapers. I doubt if the part that leaks thru has much effect on me. The idea of drinking a soft drink that has to be ordered by its brand name strikes me as undignified.

[danthered.livejournal.com]

Perhaps, but advertising psychology is a very well developed field. Effective advertising works without the target realising it's working on him, and the best advertising works while making the target think it hasn't.

[come-to-think.livejournal.com]

I dare say it is a well-developed field, but who pays its practitioners? The more a science has to do with human beings, the larger the proportion of questions in it that are party questions, and the harder it is to tell it from a religion or a racket.

[danthered.livejournal.com]

Hard to tell advertising or psychology from a religion or racket? Yyyyyyyyes, I'll grant you that, but I find the premise of the assertion problematic in that it is impossible to tell a religion from a racket, and a solid case can be made that they are one and the latter.

I'm not sure what is meant by "party questions".

[come-to-think.livejournal.com]

By "one and the latter" do you mean "one and the same"?

A party question is a question that is typically answered according to one's allegiance rather than according to the evidence. If I were to venture an opinion on nature vs nurture in the causation of some ability or other, or on whether the rich or the poor are a greater burden on society, few people would pay much attention to my arguments or evidence; most would look at them just long enough to determine what gang they think I belong to. I have never seen the inside of a promotion department or an advertising agency, but I strongly suspect that in such milieux, statements about the effectiveness of this or that project are judged chiefly by their usefulness in protecting & expanding the speakers' jobs.

[danthered.livejournal.com]

Yes, "one and the latter" was my economical way of saying "one and the same, and they are both the latter, i.e., religion is a racket". Perhaps too economical.

Thanks for the elaboration on party questions. Pigeonhole questions, one might also call them.

...

[dorisduke.livejournal.com]

Well it does not surprise me or disturb. Coke is known by most where other drinks have less mass knowledge. I have met folks that have never had Dr. Pepper or other perhaps more regional pops. So I suspect coke or pepsi could be used in the same way. But you notice these things so it really is not subconscious for you. But for those who have no clue I see no harm in product placement. Coke has this iron grip simply by having been a part of most of our complete lives. The flavor not only would be the point but the name, it represents a normal world, a split moment of calm in disaster. It actually is a good thing we have such powerful feelings to fall back on if ever or when we will need it.

Re: ...

[furr-a-bruin.livejournal.com]

I think it works because Coke is one of the oldest soft drinks, with (as another commenter noted) generations of brand equity and a truly enormous effort to make it a worldwide brand. Add to that the fact that while people like colas to varying degrees - and some prefer one brand to another - I don't think any of them are as polarizing as Tony's counter-example of Dr. Pepper - because while there are people who love it, there's also lots of people (like me) who simply loathe it.

My personal opinion is that about the only other soda brand that might work in this context - at least here in the USA - is 7-Up.

As for the effect of advertising - I think it works primarily on those with little experience of it. As someone in my mid-40s, my buying patterns are pretty well set and I don't see advertising changing what my favorite peanut butter is, or my preferred car brand, or the like.

[gloeden.livejournal.com]

Hey, you!

[broduke2000.livejournal.com]

One of my pet peeves is all the acid in Coke. You can clean up a corroding battery with Coke and make the metal shine.

I unfortunately found out about acid-filtered RC after it was too late, and I didn't have a stomach.

Someday I wanna make a video.

[danthered.livejournal.com]

You can do much more than just clean a corroded battery with Coke™. You can limber up rusted fasteners and parts, too. Much cheaper than Naval Jelly, and contains the same chemical: Phosphoric acid.