Best-Selling Author, ex-Coke CMO and Marketing Visionary Sergio Zyman spoke with The Reboot Chronicles about what was said to be an epic fail in marketing (remember the introduction of New Coke?). As the first person to EVER hold the title of Chief Marketing Officer, he should know! Lots of good nuggets in this episode, from his thoughts on pandemic marketing to why marketers are still focusing way too much on TV—including $6 mil. Super Bowl Ads.

We had to, of course, address the elephant in the marketing room of the introduction of New Coke. So was it the debacle it was reputed to be? For those of you not around in the ‘80s it was all over the media. A guy at Coke dared to do what pretty much every soft drink in the world does now on a regular basis: introduce a new flavor. But here, someone was messing with an iconic brand. In response to the onslaught of the Pepsi Generation (that’s what young people drink!) Sergio backed the introduction of an updated formulation for Coke. Turns out there were a whole lot more lovers of the classic formulation than the company expected. Within a month, “Classic Coke” was back, fans were delighted.

So what was the real story? As Sergio relates, there is more to it than I ever understood: