Monday, April 19, 2010

Soda stock prices...Invest in Coke, Invest in Pepsi

The Cola War is as deeply rooted as the rivalries between Republicans and Democrats, Wrestling Fans and people who hate pro wrestling, Rock Musicians and the PRMC...ok, maybe I digress...

But the Cola Wars seems to have no end in sight. Perhaps you can profit form the profits!

My understanding what is happening, financially, with both product lines you can make an educated opinion.

(The views expressed in this article do not express my personal views. In fact, I dont own stock in either company, but I drink a LOT of their products!)

Read a great, recent article (4/19/2010) evaluating current stock prices here.

Coca Cola's recent stock price and company information on Morningstar here.

Morningstar's review of Pepsi's Q4 performance here.

Morningstar's evaluation of Jones Soda here.
JONES SODA?!?!? Well...yeah! They are a creative little bunch and deserved some finanical press!

Of course, LAST year Motley Fool was down on Jones Soda.
See here.

Well look...we cant base our lives around Coke and Pepsi, people!

The bottom line is that you have a lot of options, but you have to do oyour homework.
The stock market looks like a fun place to gamble, but you can actually beat the house better than any poker player if you research carefully and invest on things you understand.

Like soda.

Friday, April 16, 2010

Harry Potter indeed...Dungeons & Dragons soda!

It's true! Jones Soda has a limited edition Dungeons and Dragons collection!

I played a bit of D&D in my time.
Aw who am I kidding?! I used to play ALL the time!
(That might explain why I didn't DATE much in High School!)

If you are familiar with the game, then you will appreciate the flavors Jones is bringing out:
• • Potion of Healing
• • Illthid Brain Juice
• • Sneak Attack
• • Eldritch Blast
• • Dwarven Draught
• • Bigby's Crushing Thirst Destroyer

Jones has a history of offering interesting flavors, especially around the holidays. This line of flavors will get all of the Harry Potter fans, as well as the How to Train a Dragon fans, and perhaps a few Lighting Thief fans off their butts and into the fridge for a nice cold one!

Friday, April 9, 2010

OK Soda from Coca Cola...not really OK, but kinda cool!

How I came across OK Soda, I don't' remember.
But reading about it I learned it was a really interesting concept that just didn't get off the ground.

Wikipedia defines the endeavor as - OK Soda was a soft drink created by The Coca-Cola Company in 1993 that aggressively courted the Generation X demographic with unusual advertising tactics, including endorsements and even outright negative publicity.

Any good? Well, the Time website called it #1 on the list of Top 10 Bad Beverage Ideas.

But I think the marketing needs to be explored.
The entire idea behind OK Soda was to come up with something for the Gen X crowd, and marketing to them in a way that ACKNOWLEDGED that they did not want to be marketed to.
They did not want anything that was part of the corporate-culture machine.

This meant unique cans, unique soda machines and self-depreciating marketing slogans.
In fact, Kayfabe.net writes about their marketing efforts (and shows a great pic of an OK Soda soda machine!) here..

Suck.com writes an interesting piece about OK Soda here.

For a really good, in depth review of the story of OK Soda, you have to check out the article from Cavalcade of Awesome. GREAT coverage. (Editor's Note - Cavalcade of Awesome is a website and not a Rock Band.)

I thought I'd take a second to note that it was Roberto Goizuetta's idea to bring back Sergio Zyman to Coke's marketing group (he was fired after the New Coke debacle)...and Sergio's came up with the entire business model for OK Soda. Why do I share this with you? Because I'm a huge Goizuetta fan! :)

While most soda reviews just KILL a product (See yesterday's post about Chocolate Cherry Dr. Pepper) I found it interesting the OK Soda has a Facebook Fansite! Ok...maybe it IS Ok after all!

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Cherry Chocolate Diet Dr. Pepper...really?!









If you like soda as much as I do...and you like Chocolate as much as I do...and like cherries a bit to boot...then seeing something called Cherry Chocolate Diet Dr. Pepper should catch your eye right away!



It did mine.



I LOVE Dr. Pepper, but I never heard of THIS flavor and had to do a little research to see what I had missed.



According to Wikipedia:

Diet Cherry Chocolate Dr Pepper (2007–2008) was introduced as a limited edition flavor on November 21, 2007. It was discontinued in April 2008. It became available in Canada in early January 2008. A non-diet version was never created. The taste is similar to Canfield's Diet Cherry Chocolate Fudge Soda but with the distinctive Dr Pepper flavor.

Limited Edition all right! It ran for 5 months.

That does not smack of word recognition.

If it WAS world-renoun, it would have gotten a comeback each November, no?

Cherry Chocolate Rain video on You Tube. It's by Tay Zonday, the knucklehead who did the original Chocolate Rain. I don't know how much Dr. Pepper paid him, but...

Junk Food Blog reviews the soda here. (No mention of the video.)

Appropo of Something, which just KILLED Dr. Pepper's Berries and Cream flavor, reviews the Cherry Chocolate flavor here. (you will absolutely have to brush your teeth after reading the Berries and Cream review...)

Associated Content gave a 2-page, thorough review of the drink here. Well, it's 2 pages due to all the click-thru ads! However, while I enjoyed the humor of the above reviews, I give Associated Content big ups for doing a non-biased review.


So the question of "what did I miss" apparently turns out to be "not terribly much!"

I'm disappointed. It sure SOUNDS delicious.

For Cherries and Chocolate, I guess we'll have to stick with the world's favorite: Mrs. Cavanaugh's Chocolate Cherry Cordials. YUM-MEEE!