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Friday, May 19, 2006

Blue coloring -- a reliable way to fail

posted by John Craven at 11:39 AM


Blue colored soft drinks never survive. Yes, I mean products that use blue colored fluid -- not things like blueberry or the few other things in nature that have a hue that is naturally blue.

The greatest example of a blue failure is Pepsi Blue. Not only did it use blue coloring, but it even used the word "blue" in the name to call extra attention to it. There have been many many many energy drinks that use blue coloring that have attempted to make it in the market. Russell Simmons Def Con 3 is the only one that actually was memorable, but that's more because Mr. Simmons is not the type of character you typically meet in this industry.

Anyway, since it is my job to now hypothesize about the inevitable failure of blue-colored products, I'd suggest that blue -- especially that bright blue that's usually used -- is a color that is clearly not derived from nature and, therefore, in the subconscious mind of consumers, they don't want to drink things that don't have some loose tie to nature. Whether I'm right or wrong about that theory is open for debate, but the numbers don't lie -- blue drinks don't sell.

Agree? Disagree? Is there a product that is blue and actually was commercially successful?? Feel free to post comments below.

9 Comments:

Anonymous said...

HI very intersting point , are u referring about the BLUE liquid or also Blue labelling of the product ?

5/23/2006 05:54:00 AM  
Anonymous said...

Jolt Blue anyone???? That stuff moves like wildfire

5/23/2006 11:04:00 AM  
Anonymous said...

I Agree that blue beverages have a bad history. Also agree with previous anonymous guy/gal/ whatever; Blue Jolt is a top seller with kids... but it is a line extention... there are now 6 flavors of Jolt and they sell well together... but blue by itself would be dead....like Jones.... the brands need that rainbow so kids can try them all and get addicted to a couple of flavors.
CSD distributor of all that stuff.

5/23/2006 05:39:00 PM  
Anonymous said...

You're probably right about blue liquids not selling well but I tend to think that it's because most blue beverages don't taste good. The blue is used as a gimmick and once the public actually tries the product and discovers what a marketing gimmick tastes like they aren't impressed.

5/23/2006 11:29:00 PM  
Anonymous said...

Depressing that they stopped selling this drink. I absolutely loved it.

5/25/2006 02:03:00 AM  
Anonymous said...

We stopped distributing Pepsi Blue after the first pallet left the warehouse.

Even right from the lauch it was hard to give it away.

Needless to say, if it's blue, we tend not to order it.

6/04/2006 08:19:00 AM  
Stezton said...

To me blue drinks make me think of windshield wiper fluid. ;-)

6/11/2006 06:52:00 AM  
soft_guy said...

My favorite soda is Frostie Blue Cream Soda. I don't know if it is successful - it is hard to find, but it sure is a great soda.

7/14/2006 03:43:00 PM  
Anonymous said...

http://pubs.acs.org/cen/whatstuff/stuff/8134foodcoloring.html

Blue isn't appealing, by nature.

7/15/2006 04:11:00 PM  

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