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Pepsi Max

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This article is about the beverage available outside North America. For the North American beverage, see Pepsi Max (North America). For the roller coaster, see Pepsi Max Big One.
Pepsi Max
File:Australian version of Pepsi Max can.jpg
TypeDiet Cola
ManufacturerPepsiCo
Country of origin United Kingdom, Italy, Turkey
Introduced1993
VariantsPepsi Max Cappuccino, Pepsi Max Twist, Pepsi Max Punch
Related productsPepsi ONE, Diet Pepsi
Websitepepsi.co.uk Edit this on Wikidata

Pepsi Max is a low-calorie, sugar-free cola, marketed by PepsiCo as an alternative to Pepsi and Diet Pepsi.

A drink with the same name but different ingredients (such as ginseng and higher caffeine levels) is sold in the United States as "Pepsi Max".

History

Standard 500ml Pepsi Max bottle from the UK.

Pepsi Max debuted in United Kingdom and Italy in April 1993. The rollout was expanded to Ireland the following September, and to France, Greece, Spain, Portugal the Netherlands and Australia the following December. By the end of 1994, Pepsi Max was sold in approximately twenty countries. By the end of 1995, that figure had more than doubled. The product remained unavailable in the United States until only recently (the U.S. is PepsiCo's native market, and the largest consumer of carbonated soft drinks), where one of its principal ingredients had not yet been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. The ingredient in question—acesulfame potassium—is combined with aspartame to provide the beverage's sweetness, whereas some other diet colas are sweetened by aspartame alone.

On 28 May 1994, England's Blackpool Pleasure Beach amusement park opened the Pepsi Max Big One steel roller coaster. At the time, the Pepsi-sponsored attraction was the world's tallest and fastest roller coaster. Both records subsequently were broken elsewhere, but to this date, it still remains the tallest roller coaster in the United Kingdom, and one of the tallest and longest coasters in Europe.

In early 2005, Pepsi Max Twist (with added lemon-lime flavour) joined the UK and Australian product line. In autumn 2005, Pepsi Max Punch was marketed in the UK for the festive season. Containing ginger and cinnamon, the product was similar in flavour to Pepsi Holiday Spice, a sugar-sweetened variety of Pepsi that was marketed in the U.S. one year earlier. In late 2005 and early 2006, a coffee-flavoured variety was introduced in France, Finland, Ireland, Norway and the UK. Known as Pepsi Max Cappuccino (Pepsi Max Coffee Cino in the UK), the product is predated by the similar Pepsi Kona (briefly test-marketed in the U.S. in 1996) and Pepsi Tarik (available in Malaysia since 2005).

Pepsi Max was introduced into South Korea, Bulgaria and the Philippines during 2006, as well as being reintroduced into Argentina in the spring of 2006 after being phased out after its launch in 1994. As well as this, Pepsi Max was introduced into Brazil, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and the UAE during early 2007.

In October 2008, Pepsi announced they would be redesigning their logo and re-branding many of their products. Pepsi, Diet Pepsi and Pepsi Max all use lower-case fonts for name brands, Mountain Dew was renamed "Mtn Dew," and Diet Pepsi Max was re-branded as Pepsi Max. The brand's blue and red globe trademark became a series of "smiles," with the central white band arcing at different angles depending on the product. The new imagery has started to be used. In the case of Pepsi Max, besides the renaming of the drink to its international name, the logo has a large "smile" likely to emphasize the North American drink's "Wake up people!" advertising campaign, and also uses black in the bottom half of the globe as opposed to the more standard royal blue. The new lower-case font used on Pepsi's products are reminiscent of the font used in Diet Pepsi's logo from the 1960s to the mid-1980s. The website for the "Wake up people!" campaign now redirects to the Pepsi Refresh Project. It is expected that the version of Pepsi Max outside North America will adopt the new logo used by its U.S. / Canada counterpart; this has now occurred in Australia. In the UK, the cans now have the 'pepsi' text and the new Pepsi globe (with the normal pepsi 'smile' and the blue bottom half, as opposed to the black half used in the US) but the 'Max' is in the previous style.

A Pepsi Max Lime version was released in the United States in February 2010 under the name "Pepsi Max Cease Fire". (which later introduced into the UK in late 2011) It was cross-promoted with a new flavor series of Doritos chips called "3rd Degree Burn". In July 2010, Pepsi began to move its North American branding for Pepsi Max to match its global branding. It now carries a Max typography similar to what is used worldwide, and rolled out a new slogan: "Zero Calories. Maximum Pepsi Taste." Its formula has not been changed. In May 2011, Pepsi introduced the drink to Spain.

Product positioning

Recent UK/Australia Pepsi Max television advertisements have featured the taglines "Maximum taste, no sugar" and "Don't worry, there's no sugar." Some have incorporated extreme sports and video games such as Motocross Mania in an attempt to appeal to young men (in contrast to other diet cola drinks, which tend to target young women). The British advertising campaign involved retouched versions of the American "Do the Dew" commercials for Mountain Dew (A variant of which is sold in the UK ), rebranded as "Live life to the Max".

File:Zero to Max.jpg
"Zero to Max" campaign poster advertising Pepsi Max on the London underground

Coca-Cola Zero, a sugar-free cola from the Coca-Cola Company, is marketed in a similar manner. In the UK some Coke Zero advertising alluded to Pepsi Max, leading to a robust counter-campaign by Pepsi directly extolling the virtues of the concept of "maximum" over that of "zero."

Name Definition
Citron Citron Vert Lemon and Lime flavor; sold in France.
Twist Lemon and lime flavor; sold in the United Kingdom and Argentina, and in the United States lemon flavor.
Cease Fire Lime flavor; sold in North America and Australia, which was cross-promoted with the 3rd Degree Burn flavor of Doritos (Sold as Citrus Freeze in the UK).
Punch Ginger and Cinnamon flavor; sold in the UK during Christmas 2005. Similar to Pepsi Holiday Spice.
Cino Coffee flavor; briefly sold in Europe.
Cool Lemon Lemon flavor; sold in Europe.
Chill Apple flavor; sold in Sweden and Finland (limited edition, summer 2007).
Mojo Mint and lime flavor; sold in Finland (limited edition, 2008). Also sold in Denmark until August 2009.
Cherry Cherry flavor; Sold in the UK, Norway and Denmark.
Citrus Freeze Lime flavor; sold in the UK — marketed alongside Doritos Jalapeño Fire flavor crisps as part of a 2011 promotion, that is similar to the earlier Cease Fire promotion in the US and Australia.

In early 2005, Pepsi ONE was revised, with Splenda brand sucralose replacing the aspartame ingredient.

Controversies

Suicide

In December 2008, advertisements for Pepsi Max that depicted a cartoon calorie committing suicide were run in a German lifestyle magazine, which resulted in a scandal and the revoking of the ads.[1] One of the three ads featured a bean-shaped character simultaneously shooting himself in the head, with a noose round his neck, and poison in his other hand. The character is supposed to be “one very very very lonely calorie.”[2][3]

Canadian formulation

Beginning in early 1994, an entirely different Pepsi Max was marketed in Canada. Now regarded as a precursor to Pepsi Edge, it was sweetened with a combination of aspartame and high fructose corn syrup. As a result, it contained 2/3 fewer calories than full-sugar colas (including regular Pepsi), but more calories than conventional diet/light colas (or the version of Pepsi Max sold elsewhere). The Canadian product was discontinued in 2002; the Diet Pepsi Max product introduced in 2008 has no direct relationship to the earlier formulation.

In the Nintendo 64 game Conker's Bad Fur Day and its Xbox remake, Conker: Live & Reloaded, Conker meets a scarecrow named Birdy, who asks for "Mepsipax" in return for a manual.

According to Sacha Baron Cohen's character, Borat, a Pepsi Max factory was responsible for the evaporation of Kazakhstan's Aral Sea.

The soft drink has also been seen in the popular "Uncle Drew" commercials, featuring Cleveland Cavaliers All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving.

In the 2001 PlayStation one game, Motocross Mania, Pepsi Max logos are on the sides of all the race tracks.

There is an in-universe advertisement for Pepsi Max on the Tour Championship course in the movie Happy Gilmore.

A Pepsi Max vending machine can be seen during the hospital fight scene in the 2015 film Terminator Genisys.

In the Japanese anime "Tiger & Bunny", Superheroine blue rose is sponsored by pepsi max and is used as a commercial in the anime.

See also

References

Notations

  • Kotabe, M. and Helsen, K. Global Marketing Management, John Wiley & Sons, 2004. ISBN 0-471-23062-6

Footnotes

  1. ^ Thomas Grillo (December 4, 2008), Pepsi kills ads depicting suicide, Boston Herald
  2. ^ "BBDO Airs "Suicide" Ads for Pepsi Max — CBS News". Bnet.com. 2008-12-03. Retrieved 2012-10-22.
  3. ^ Creamer, Matthew (2008-12-02). "Pepsi Opens Vein of Controversy With New Suicide-Themed Ads | Global News — Advertising Age". Adage.com. Retrieved 2012-10-22.
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