What happened to… Crystal Pepsi?
Global News
Erica Vella revisits the elusive drink from the 90s, Crystal Pepsi; she learns why the pop flopped and if there is a chance the cola could ever make a return to store shelves.
On this episode of What happened to…? Erica Vella revisits the elusive drink from the 1990s, Crystal Pepsi. She learns why the pop flopped and asks if there is a chance the cola could ever return to store shelves.
Crystal Pepsi was launched in 1992. The soft drink’s creator had arrived at PepsiCo. several months earlier with a goal to innovate.
“One of the reasons why I brought it in is that Pepsi at that point in time was really struggling with sales and we really needed to get the business moving,” said David Novak, who was hired as executive vice-president of marketing sales for Pepsi Cola in 1990.
Novak had previously worked as the senior vice-president of marketing for the chain Pizza Hut.
“I was the first person ever brought in to Pepsi from the foodservice divisions to run marketing. It was a big challenge.”
“One of the reasons why I was brought in is that we’d had great success at Pizza Hut. We turned the business around and our marketing campaign was great. We had great commercials and people were really excited about what we’d done,” he said.
READ MORE: Coke, Pepsi and… Ayds?
From the late 1980s to the early 2000s, companies made the move to create products that were colourless or transparent as it was often equated with purity.