In a TV commercial that aired this week during ABC's "The Bachelorette," a short-sleeved Santa Claus jumps off the dance floor and sidles up to a beachside cabana. The bartender, aware of the jolly gent's long-standing marketing deal, instinctively grabs two bottles of Coca-Cola. Santa shakes his head.
"Make it a Pepsi," he says. "I'm on vacation. Gonna have a little fun!"
PepsiCo's appropriation of Santa, unofficially a Coca-Cola symbol since 1931, is a sign that the cola wars are back. In the months ahead, get ready for sarcasm, trash talking and all the other hallmarks of sharp-elbowed competition between the world's two biggest soft drink companies.
"Pepsi has a tradition over time of doing this kind of communication," said Massimo d'Amore, chief executive officer of PepsiCo Beverages Americas. "It's funny and witty. Everybody benefits. The category grows, and it's something U.S. consumers love to watch. It's a competitive spirit."
In recent months, PepsiCo's ads featuring two hypercompetitive delivery truck drivers have pushed Pepsi Max and tweaked Coke Zero. And going back in history, taste challenges sponsored by Pepsi arguably pushed Coca-Cola into one of the biggest marketing blunders of all time: the temporary replacement of traditional Coke with "New Coke" in 1985.
Coca-Cola Co. had no comment on the latest Pepsi campaign, titled "Summer Time is Pepsi Time." The campaign includes multimedia elements such as allowing the "naughty elf" from the latest commercial to take over Pepsi's Twitter page.
"We want to surround the consumer with this message," d'Amore said. "And we want to do it now because in the summer consumption is the highest."
PepsiCo is increasing its spending on TV advertising for beverages by 30 percent in North America this year. It also has a $60 million sponsorship of Simon Cowell's "X Factor."
It is trying to strike back after Diet Coke passed Pepsi to become the country's No. 2 soft drink last year. The Wall Street Journal called that leap-frogging a "huge embarrassment," although d'Amore said the media blew the story out of proportion.
The new campaign emphasizes a point Pepsi has been hammering for years: Outside of soft drink fountains, where Coca-Cola is dominant, the companies are much more evenly matched.
"The key point of the message is that when a consumer has a choice, the consumer chooses Pepsi," d'Amore said. "Even Santa, when he's not under contract, he prefers Pepsi."
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