Coca-Cola
After pharmacist John S. Pemberton invented a stimulating new soft drink in 1886, his carbonated and caffeinated creation quickly rose to national and worldwide prominence. It became not only an integral part of everyday life in the United States, but also the American national drink and a defining element of twentiethcentury American culture.
The drink, the brand’s logo, and the Coca-Cola bottle, created by Alexander Samuelson in 1915, turned into symbols of consumerism and the American way of life. Admired by some, despised by others, Coca-Cola faces a large number of cultural critics who consider its enormous success to be the CocaColonization of the world. Both sides, however, agree that the success of CocaCola is evidence of the value and symbolic power of a worldwide and decades-long advertising campaign. The new concept of a brand was one of the most important product innovations in the history of the consumer society, and Coca-Cola paved the way for the new worldwide culture of brands.In 1929, the first Coca-Cola vending machines were installed in Germany. Only one year later, the German branch of the Coca-Cola Company was founded in Essen. This company was an essential element in the economic and cultural Americanization of German society. Before World War I, Germans considered the United States to be a distant land of dreams, a place that held their hopes for freedom after emigration. This attitude changed with Germany’s defeat and the arrival of American loans, companies, and products. After Germany’s economy stabilized, American companies and products pushed their way into the German market. Coca-Cola, Wrigley’s Chewing Gum, and Kellogg’s Corn Flakes became staples in the homes of affluent families. Their appearance fed the discourse about the place of American products in everyday life and about the advantages and disadvantages of Americanization.
Even after 1933, American products were not banned but further constituted an integral part of German consumption. Initially, Coca-Cola with its advertisements promising leisure, freedom, and fun seemed to contrast the political and ideological climate of Nazi Germany. Subsequently, some Nazi dignitaries who considered the American soft drink to be un-German made their doubts public and demanded an end to the continuous presence of Coca-Cola. Nevertheless, the CocaCola Company developed and nurtured a close and friendly relationship with the German government. This became evident in the rare legal exception that allowed Coca-Cola to use bottles that did not comply with the standardized measurements set by the German Reichsflaschenverordnung (the imperial law about the standard measurements of bottles). Only between 1942 and 1949 was production of Coca-Cola inside Germany halted because of lack of raw materials.Coca-Cola’s big breakthrough in Germany came after World War II, when Coca-Cola plants followed U.S. soldiers who were stationed there. After the founding of the West German state and the Wirtschaftswunder (economic miracle), Coca-Cola won over a significant group of new customers with its slogan “Mach mal Pause!” (Take a Break!). This slogan captured the attention of millions of busy, hardworking West Germans who longed for joy after years of war, destruction, and reconstruction. This 1950s Coca-Cola slo-
gan, repeated again and again in advertisements, reached an unprecedented level of fame by entering the German vocabulary as an unchangeable and oft-quoted saying. It is now used by German speakers to ask somebody to take a break from work and career or to sarcastically interrupt somebody’s never-ending monologue. In the 1970s and 1980s, new English slogans, such as “Enjoy Coca-Cola” and “CocaCola is it,” were introduced to customers who could then consider themselves “cooler” and happier because they were consuming the only “right” drink, the one everybody else was drinking.
After 1989 and the fall of the Berlin Wall, Coca-Cola expanded into the former German Democratic Republic (GDR). Even more than in post—World War II West German society, Coca-Cola was not just a drink in East Germany. It was considered a symbol of the triumph of Western capitalism, and the bottles and cans were collected as trophies. Drinking Coca-Cola in the former Eastern European Communist countries thus became a symbolic and reassuring act of integration into the Western world, and the substitute cola that had been produced for years in the GDR did not stand a chance.
Alexander Schug
See also Americanization; Chewing Gum; Consumerism; McDonald’s Restaurant
References and Further Reading
Beyer, Chris H. Coca-Cola Girls: An Advertising Art History. Portland: Collectors Press, 2000.
Domentat, Tamara. Coca-Cola, Jazz, und AFN: Berlin und die Amerikaner. Berlin: Schwarzkopf und Schwarzkopf, 1995.
Rose, Rogger, and Patra McSharry Sevastiades, eds. Coca-Cola Culture: Icons of Pop. New York: Rosen, 1993.
Watters, Pat. Coca-Cola: An Illustrated History. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1978.
Coca-Cola’s 1955 slogan “Mach mal Pause!” (“Take a Break!”) captured the attention of millions of busy, hardworking West Germans who longed for joy after years of war, destruction, and reconstruction. (Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin)