Pepsi Selling Its Soul

In light of the cacophony of yakking about this week's Pepsi debacle, I thought it would be a good idea to remind everyone that Pepsi cluelessness is nothing new.  Here is a piece I wrote back in 2013 that did a pretty good job of  presaging the hijinks of the past week. Pepsi stupidity is something you can always count on...

January 10, 2013

One of the great things about the marketing world is that if things get really bad, if everything is caving in around you, if your whole world is crumbling and you desperately need a laugh, you can always Google "Pepsi marketing" and have yourself a hearty chuckle.

Just spend a few minutes rooting around in their amazing alternate universe and you're sure to find a treasure trove of fun, guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

Here at Ad Contrarian Labs, we have been chronicling the wonderfully entertaining, yet seriously preposterous, goings-on at Pepsi for years. And every time we think it can't get any more silly, we are proven wrong.

As we predicted years ago...

"PepsiCo's soda business is in the midst of an epic, historic collapse."

...said Business Insider a few weeks ago. They went on to report...

"In Q3 2012, volume at its American division declined 3%, driven by a 4% decline in North America. There was a 7% revenue decline to $5.5 billion. In March 2011, Pepsi was humbled as Diet Coke became the nation's No.2 favorite drink behind Coke, and Pepsi slipped to No.3. Diet Pepsi is only the 7th most-drunk soda in the U.S."

Gosh. Whodathunkit?

But don't worry. In an article that appeared recently, they seem to have a whole new vocabulary of knucklehead double-talk (Pepsi leads the league in that category) that is sure to save them. This comes from the Pepsi Global Beverage Group Foresight Director. Yes, they actually have someone with that title. The more dreadful their business gets, the more ridiculously pompous their titles get.

I wonder how the Global Beverage Group Foresight Director gets along with the President-Global Enjoyment and the Global Chief Marketing Officer-Hydration. I'm starting to believe the most creative employee in the company is the HR person who comes up with these breathtaking titles.

As an aside, I think I have a good strategy for bringing Pepsi's beverage business back to life. Fire all the overfed worldwide globalizers and hire an Ad Manager who'll let the agency make some decent fucking ads.

But I digress...

The Global Beverage Group Foresight Director thinks he has the solution to Pepsi's problems. He says...

"There's a growing realisation that ... innovation has to come out of the brand soul."

Apparently, in the ever more ludicrous lexicon of brand babble, brands no longer have "DNA", now they have "soul."

It seems that innovation has not been coming out of Pepsi's "brand soul." It's been coming out of the elevator, or the janitor's closet or something. Now they are searching for the brand's soul and -- pop -- out will come the innovations. Sounds like fun.

I wonder how much some brilliant branding consultant is going to charge them to find the brand's soul? Personally, I wouldn't do it for less than 2 million.

The Foreskin Foresight Director also thinks it's important

"...that people running a brand share a "sense of being" with its buyers"

As a sometime Pepsi buyer, it is very clear to me that the people running the brand and I do not share a sense of being. I'm not even sure I have a sense of being anymore. I think I lost it. Maybe Pepsi can give it back to me. Sometimes at about 3 a.m. I have a sense of peeing. But I don't think that's what they mean.

The Foreplay Foresight Director wants the people who run the brand and me to...  

"... form "one big force" sharing the same goal..."

Gosh, imagine if I shared a goal with a soda brand team. What an awesome life it would be. We'd be "one big force."

The Pepsi brand team and little ol' me. My friend, it's a carbonated dream come true.

Pepsi Selling Its Soul

Lazy bastard that I am, a few years ago I decided that a good way to take a few weeks off from blogging around the holidays was to re-publish some of my favorite posts of the year. So for the next couple of weeks we're going to be in re-runs. Here's one from last January.

One of the great things about the marketing world is that if things get really bad, if everything is caving in around you, if your whole world is crumbling and you desperately need a laugh, you can always Google "Pepsi marketing" and have yourself a hearty chuckle.

Just spend a few minutes rooting around in their amazing alternate universe and you're sure to find a treasure trove of fun, guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

Here at Ad Contrarian Labs, we have been chronicling the wonderfully entertaining, yet seriously preposterous, goings-on at Pepsi for years. And every time we think it can't get any more silly, we are proven wrong.

 As we predicted years ago...

"PepsiCo's soda business is in the midst of an epic, historic collapse."

...said Business Insider a few weeks ago. They went on to report...

"In Q3 2012, volume at its American division declined 3%, driven by a 4% decline in North America. There was a 7% revenue decline to $5.5 billion. In March 2011, Pepsi was humbled as Diet Coke became the nation's No.2 favorite drink behind Coke, and Pepsi slipped to No.3. Diet Pepsi is only the 7th most-drunk soda in the U.S."

Gosh. Whodathunkit?

But don't worry. In an article that appeared recently, they seem to have a whole new vocabulary of knucklehead double-talk (Pepsi leads the league in that category) that is sure to save them. This comes from the Pepsi Global Beverage Group Foresight Director. Yes, they actually have someone called that. The more dreadful their business gets, the more ridiculously pompous their titles get.

I wonder how the Global Beverage Group Foresight Director gets along with the President-Global Enjoyment and the Global Chief Marketing Officer-Hydration. I'm starting to believe the most creative employee in the company is the HR nitwit who comes up with these breathtaking titles.

As an aside, I think I have a good strategy for bringing Pepsi's beverage business back to life. Fire all the overfed worldwide globalizers and hire an Ad Manager who'll let the agency make some decent fucking ads.

But I digress...

The Global Beverage Group Foresight Director thinks he has the solution to Pepsi's problems. He says...

"There's a growing realisation that ... innovation has to come out of the brand soul."

Apparently, in the ever more ludicrous lexicon of brand babble, brands no longer have DNA, now they have soul.

It seems that innovation has not been coming out of Pepsi's "brand soul." It's been coming out of their ass, or the janitor's closet or something. Now they are searching for the brand's soul and -- pop -- out will come the innovations. Sounds like fun.

I wonder how much a branding consultant is going to charge them to find the brand's soul? Personally, I wouldn't do it for less than 2 million.

The Global Beverage Group Foresight Director also thinks it's important

"...that people running a brand share a "sense of being" with its buyers"

As a sometime Pepsi buyer, it is very clear to me that the people running the brand and I do not share a sense of being. I'm not even sure I have a sense of being. Sometimes around 3 a.m. I have a sense of peeing, but I don't think that's what they mean.

The Foresight Director wants the people who run the brand and me to...  

"... form "one big force" sharing the same goal..."

Gosh, imagine if I shared a goal with a soda brand team. What an awesome life it would be. We'd be "one big force."

The Pepsi brand team and little ol' me. My friend, it's a carbonated dream come true.

How Many Global CMOs Does It Take To Sell A Can Of Soda?

There's wonderful news from never-never land. The folks at Pepsi are at it again. This can only mean more fun and laughter for the rest us.

Having completely forgotten that their job is to sell sugar-water to pimply-faced geeks in Newark, they are doubling down on their bonehead search for worldwide, universal truths.

They have just hired a Senior VP-Global CMO for the Pepsi Trademark. Don't confuse this with the guy who used to be PepsiCo International CMO but is now CMO at Pepsi Beverages North America or the Pepsi Global Beverage Group Foresight Director or the President-Global Enjoyment or the Global CMO-Hydration. 

Ad Age reports that Pepsi's President-Global Beverages Group says that the new role of Senior VP-Global CMO for the Pepsi Trademark is "consistent with the global operating model PepsiCo has established. That model includes a global beverage group, global snacks group and global nutrition group. Eventually, each of the top 12 global brands will have a global leader."

It's a big globe after all. They're gonna need Magellan to design the org chart.

With all due respect, I would like to suggest that this really isn't Pepsi's "global operating model." If I may exhibit a little hubris here, I think I described their global operating model a little more accurately in a recent post...

"Many companies are powered by products or services initiated years or even decades ago... They persevere largely on inertia...That's why all the monkeys running around having meetings and writing memos really aren't doing that much harm."

Pepsi, however, seems to be uniquely qualified at identifying only the most dangerous monkeys and placing them where they can do extraordinary harm. But this doesn't seem to deter them.

The President-Global Beverages Group has this to say...

"Pepsi is our biggest and most global brand...

Most global? Are there degrees of globularity? It seems to me that a brand is either global or it ain't. Are there secret parts of the globe we haven't been told about? (Maybe that's where Jimmy Hoffa and the WMDs are!)

"...We have never up until very recently managed brands on a global basis...We’re marketing to global consumers that are hyper-connected to each other, no matter where they are in the world."

Yeah, well I have little update for you, amigo. It turns out all the pimply-faced geeks in Newark who are "hyper-connected" with pimply-faced geeks in Norway are not having "conversations about brands." They're texting pictures of their girlfriends' tits.

While Pepsi's new President-Global Beverages Group is pretty good at this globu-babble stuff, I'm afraid he really isn't up to the standard of inter-globularity of his predecessor Massimo d'Amore, who was quoted thusly...

"[Before] it was more of a global coordination as opposed to a global management," Mr. d'Amore said. "Technology, both social networks and mobile platforms, have created this global generation. We really want to connect our global brands with the global generation, and the best way to do that is with global management."

Just a word of caution. I'm afraid Mr. d'Amore is no longer at Pepsi. He was given a sudden involuntary globotomy.

Maybe he's with Hoffa somewhere keeping an eye on the WMDs.

Pepsi Selling Its Soul

One of the great things about the marketing world is that if things get really bad, if everything is caving in around you, if your whole world is crumbling and you desperately need a laugh, you can always Google "Pepsi marketing" and have yourself a hearty chuckle.

Just spend a few minutes rooting around in their amazing alternate universe and you're sure to find a treasure trove of fun, guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

Here at Ad Contrarian Labs, we have been chronicling the wonderfully entertaining, yet seriously preposterous, goings-on at Pepsi for years. And every time we think it can't get any more silly, we are proven wrong.

 As we predicted years ago...

"PepsiCo's soda business is in the midst of an epic, historic collapse."

...said Business Insider a few weeks ago. They went on to report...

"In Q3 2012, volume at its American division declined 3%, driven by a 4% decline in North America. There was a 7% revenue decline to $5.5 billion. In March 2011, Pepsi was humbled as Diet Coke became the nation's No.2 favorite drink behind Coke, and Pepsi slipped to No.3. Diet Pepsi is only the 7th most-drunk soda in the U.S."

Gosh. Whodathunkit?

But don't worry. In an article that appeared recently, they seem to have a whole new vocabulary of knucklehead double-talk (Pepsi leads the league in that category) that is sure to save them. This comes from the Pepsi Global Beverage Group Foresight Director. Yes, they actually have someone with that title. The more dreadful their business gets, the more ridiculously pompous their titles get.

I wonder how the Global Beverage Group Foresight Director gets along with the President-Global Enjoyment and the Global Chief Marketing Officer-Hydration. I'm starting to believe the most creative employee in the company is the HR person who comes up with these breathtaking titles.

As an aside, I think I have a good strategy for bringing Pepsi's beverage business back to life. Fire all the overfed worldwide globalizers and hire an Ad Manager who'll let the agency make some decent fucking ads.

But I digress...

The Global Beverage Group Foresight Director thinks he has the solution to Pepsi's problems. He says...

"There's a growing realisation that ... innovation has to come out of the brand soul."

Apparently, in the ever more ludicrous lexicon of brand babble, brands no longer have "DNA", now they have "soul."

It seems that innovation has not been coming out of Pepsi's "brand soul." It's been coming out of the elevator, or the janitor's closet or something. Now they are searching for the brand's soul and -- pop -- out will come the innovations. Sounds like fun.

I wonder how much some brilliant branding consultant is going to charge them to find the brand's soul? Personally, I wouldn't do it for less than 2 million.

The Foreskin Foresight Director also thinks it's important

"...that people running a brand share a "sense of being" with its buyers"

As a sometime Pepsi buyer, it is very clear to me that the people running the brand and I do not share a sense of being. I'm not even sure I have a sense of being anymore. I think I lost it. Maybe Pepsi can give it back to me. Sometimes at about 3 a.m. I have a sense of peeing. But I don't think that's what they mean.

The Foreplay Foresight Director wants the people who run the brand and me to...  

"... form "one big force" sharing the same goal..."

Gosh, imagine if I shared a goal with a soda brand team. What an awesome life it would be. We'd be "one big force."

The Pepsi brand team and little ol' me. My friend, it's a carbonated dream come true.

Attack Of The Global Enjoyment Hydrators

Marketing people just refuse to leave shit alone. Somewhere they got the idea that everything they see needs to be changed and everything they change is an improvement.

Mr. Obama's campaign slogan notwithstanding, most change is for the worse. If you've ever heard a cover of a favorite song, or gotten a new boss, this should come as no surprise.

The first thing every marketing person does when he gets a new job is to change everything. If it's red he makes it blue. If it's blue he makes it red.

Whenever I read in the trades that a successful advertiser has hired a new CMO, I know a festival of laughter is on the way. They always say the same thing: 

"X Corp has been very successful. I am not here to change that. My focus is just on making sure that we ______."

Amazingly, making sure that they ________ always seems to require that they change everything.

A couple of years ago I got fired by a client. They had been a client for 20 years. We had done excellent work for 15 years and they were remarkably successful. Then the ceo and the head of marketing retired. In the ensuing 5 years they had 6 different CMOs. Every one of them had to change everything. Every change was for the worse. Naturally, it was our fault.

A wonderful example of this is my favorite marketing freak show -- Pepsi. Recently, Jim Edwards at Business Insider had a startling recap of the changes that have gone on during the past few years in Pepsi's marketing leadership. Edwards said:

"The appropriate reaction to the news that PepsiCo has reshuffled its senior marketing management—again—is laughter.

The number of recent reorganizations at the beverage and snack group is now beyond a joke. At least 26 senior marketing managers have left Pepsi since 2008..."

According to Edwards, Pepsi has people running around headquarters with titles like "president-global enjoyment" and "global chief marketing officer-hydration." These titles are so thoroughly preposterous that you need to be George Orwell to satirize them adequately.

DAD: Son, what would you like to be when you grow up?
SON: I think I'd like to be president of global enjoyment.
DAD: It's a tough job, son. But I think you can do it!

The result of all this bureaucratic nonsense has been a new strategy every half hour, and a series of increasingly dumb advertising initiatives.

The trend toward escalating bureaucracy in marketing departments, and the concomitant absurdity of titles and overlapping of authority, gives these ninnies the idea that they're supposed to do something.

And when global enjoyment hydrators start doing something, look out.



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