
OK Soda - velmu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OK_Soda
======
echelon
This seems like something that came about a decade too early, like Neutral
Milk Hotel. If this launched today, I could see it gaining traction.

The art on the cans is pretty cool.

I love that there was a Usenet mailing list for this:

[https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.fan.ok-
soda/WQuelBjd8s8/...](https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.fan.ok-
soda/WQuelBjd8s8/M7t4pcRsBSEJ)

[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.fan.ok-
soda/9Kxv...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.fan.ok-
soda/9KxvfnhmaCE)

[https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.fan.ok-
soda/1_E_...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.fan.ok-
soda/1_E_O_HlXww)

(Not sure if Google Reader links are stable.)

~~~
allworknoplay
The marketing was a total hit where they tried it (including in my area), but
it tasted terrible. It might have been conceptually a little "out there" for
the early/mid 90s, but lots of people were talking about it, and my friends
and I really wanted it to be great. I really think the problem was that it
just sucked.

~~~
imglorp
Another marketing company that deploys product as an afterthought?

How many companies have signaled jumping the shark by renaming and rebranding,
as if any product issue can be fixed with messaging? Comcast -> Xfinity. Radio
Shack -> The Shack. Sci Fi channel -> SyFy...

As a consumer, I'm insulted when the vendor thinks I'm so shallow. As an
employee of such a vendor, it's a sign of thrash and a warning signal to look
at leadership.

~~~
stjohnswarts
I agree, if you have a good product people will flock to you, although if
everyone basically has the same thing like say sneakers (Nike!) that are
essentially the same across all vendors a brand can set you apart even though
your product isn't really any better than the competition

------
qubex
I think I was into my second year in middle school in Italy when this came
out... so it’s far from my experience in both time and space. And yet it
triggers an inexplainable sense of nostalgia in me for the nineteen-nineties,
grunge, early-New Economy, pre-9/11 world. Somehow it also makes me think of
William Gibson’s _Pattern Recognition_ , both because it features a
protagonist who is hyper-sensitive to branding to the point of allergy, and
functions as a funereal eulogy to the era.

It also reminded me of _Pepsi Perfect_ , the fictional brand of Pepsi-Cola
featured in _Back To The Future II_ ’s (now) alternate version of 2015:
[http://design.pepsico.com/pepsi-
perfect.php?v=101#section2](http://design.pepsico.com/pepsi-
perfect.php?v=101#section2)

~~~
krstffr
Yes, for some reason reading/looking at this made me super nostalgic as well!
Just want to sit in a couch in the mid 90's and listen to CD's and watch
Beavis and Butthead and read stuff in magazines instead of on the internet.

Very strong melancholic feeling.

------
micheljansen
The budget home brand of Dutch hardware store chain Gamma is called "OK". They
have everything from paint to power tools and it uses even more brutalist
packaging design:
[https://www.gamma.nl/assortiment/zoeken?f_brand_name=OK&f_ca...](https://www.gamma.nl/assortiment/zoeken?f_brand_name=OK&f_categories=Verf&scrolltofacet=categories)

Why buy good paint if you can also buy "OK" paint and pay less?

~~~
xxr
Reminds me of the Japanese brand (non-brand?) Muji:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muji](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muji)

------
ThePhysicist
When I saw the can design I immediately thought that it looks like the art
style of "David Boring"
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Boring](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Boring)),
turns out it was really Daniel Clowes who designed it. "Ghost world" is one of
my favorite stories & movies as well, but I didn't hear about O.K. soda
before. Fascinating!

While I really like the art style and dark touch I think it was probably too
niche or too off-putting for most people.

~~~
yantrams
Fellow Clowes afficionado here. That's exactly what I thought too when I
looked at the art!

Just a couple of days ago, I discovered Clowes work in the movie 'Paul'. I
thought the art work looked very much like that of Clowes' and paused the
screen to observe it closely and noticed that it was signed 'Pussey'(after Dan
Pussey, the timid cartoonist character in Clowes' universe), which confirmed
it for me :) [https://imgur.com/a/HbCLB5c](https://imgur.com/a/HbCLB5c)

Clowes also drew one of Silicon Valley's promos
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C9V2XMLUIAA8oaC.jpg](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C9V2XMLUIAA8oaC.jpg)

~~~
weare138
Eightball was one of my favorite comics back in the day.

------
schoen
I remember

① buying a can of this from a vending machine at MIT, when I visited while I
was in high school

② occasionally calling 1-800-I-FEEL-OK, especially to test out a phone or
something

~~~
PopeDotNinja
I just called this number to try it out. It's a phone sex line now. There are
supposedly hot girls for guys to talk to, but I didn't investigate the
veracity of this claim.

~~~
have_faith
I will volunteer to perform this hard hitting investigate journalism.

~~~
ben_w
Now I have two questions:

1\. Is the sort of thing ever outsourced to, for example, India? Or wherever
else is a common place for call centres if it’s no longer there.

2\. Is anyone currently doing this with chat bots and speech synthesisers?

~~~
PopeDotNinja
>> 1\. Is the sort of thing ever outsourced to, for example, India? Or
wherever else is a common place for call centres if it’s no longer there

I don't know if there are call centers full of phone sex workers. You'd have
the same background noise you get when calling any call center. And the
workers would have to get paid when nothing was happening.

Here's a read on the topic:

[https://www.businessinsider.com/reality-of-being-a-phone-
sex...](https://www.businessinsider.com/reality-of-being-a-phone-sex-
operator-2015-5)

>> 2\. Is anyone currently doing this with chat bots and speech synthesisers?

Me: Hey Google, talk dirty to me.

Google: Manure. Dust. Crusty crumbs on the floor. <Poop emoji>

I can only report that Google does not talk dirty to me at this time.

------
durpleDrank
I drank this regularly in Junior High. It basically tasted like "Swamp Water"
(all the available sodas at a fountain mixed together) with a slight awkward
vanilla or black liquorice tone. I remember it tasting especially bad if it
wasn't cold.

Blast from the past, not sure why it is on HN, I did a double take. Didn't
know I was in a "Test Market". Ok Soda and ORBITZ were the only flash in the
pan sodas I remember from that generation.

~~~
hammock
I love the term "swamp water." We called it making a suicide.

Also, just looking at the ingredients of OK Soda I expected it to taste like
Coke and Mountain Dew mixed together.

------
raverbashing
Scored too high in the #fellowkids scale to work out.

Especially since it seems a fine example of design by committee. Test markets,
reports. Gee I wonder why Gen X was cynical like that.

Oh and they even had a "manifesto" that was in some ironic way a
"selfawarewolf".

~~~
mcny
How come we don’t hear more about gen x? It is always millennials are lazy or
millennials are killing this or millennials are destroying that. Even when gen
z does this ok boomer thing, it is the millennials who are blamed of being
disrespectful (my understanding is very few of us are doing the ok boomer
thing — we are in our thirties now!)

~~~
true_religion
20 years ago, all you heard about was generation X. They had their time.

~~~
CPLX
We're not dead yet...

------
zorpner
There are two critical things to recall about OK Soda:

1\. This article in The Baffler: [https://thebaffler.com/salvos/id-like-to-
force-the-world-to-...](https://thebaffler.com/salvos/id-like-to-force-the-
world-to-sing)

2\. 2/3 Coca-cola, 1/4 Orange Soda, 1/12 Dr. Pepper

~~~
sergers
A funny thing, sometimes a shitmix has it's own unique taste.

Ever try "thumbs up"? First time I tried it I was like gross, what did they
mix all the flavors?

But the distinct taste grew on you.

~~~
jfk13
Assuming you mean the Indian soft drink, IIRC it's actually "Thums Up" (no
"b").

~~~
nkoren
That's correct, and the "weird taste" relative to other sodas was (is? Been a
while since I've been to India, and I noticed it was losing market share badly
last time I was there...) cardamom. Cardamom is put to good use throughout
Indian cuisine (chai, sag dishes, etc.), making Thums Up really much more
complementary than traditional western sodas.

------
LeonM
If you are into this kind of stuff, I recommend watching the movie Syrup [0].
It's a fictional movie about marketing/branding within a soda company.

[0]
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0762138/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0762138/)

------
dhosek
When I saw marketed at Gen X, the first thing I thought of was at that time,
one of the conventional bits of wisdom about Gen X was that we were resistant
to being marketed at. I'm not sure that I buy that—Gen X bought into a lot of
lame stuff marketed at them, but this seemed exactly the sort of marketing
campaign which would support the conventional wisdom.

------
DonHopkins
I'll just stick to my FUCKING STRONG COFFEE thank you.

[https://www.goodbeans.nl/](https://www.goodbeans.nl/)

[https://www.facebook.com/fingstrongcoffee/](https://www.facebook.com/fingstrongcoffee/)

~~~
colinhb
Good coffee, nice people. They're my neighbors in Amsterdam.

~~~
DonHopkins
The stuff sure delivers on its promise! I used to live near you too, since I
got it at the place on Binnen Oranjestraat, near Relax and Small World
Catering (a really great place with nice people, too).

~~~
colinhb
Small World Catering is great! They’re still doing some take-out out business
through the window. (During Coronavirus, I mean.)

------
yantrams
They featured the work of Clowes and Burns! Very cool.

Just a couple of days ago, I discovered Clowes work in the movie 'Paul'. I
thought the art work looked very much like that of Clowes' and paused the
screen to observe it closely and noticed that it was signed 'Pussey'(after Dan
Pussey, the timid cartoonist character in Clowes' universe), which confirmed
it for me :) [https://imgur.com/a/HbCLB5c](https://imgur.com/a/HbCLB5c)

Clowes also drew one of Silicon Valley's promos
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C9V2XMLUIAA8oaC.jpg](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C9V2XMLUIAA8oaC.jpg)

~~~
menor
Yes, two of my favorite comic artists from the 90s. I was clearly in the
target for this soda, although I have never been into soda. Maybe that was the
error.

------
austincheney
I find the contrasts between Gen X and Millennial stereotypes quite striking.
You can see it in the media, which was often simply a dramatized perversion of
generational self-reflection to sell media.

The Gen X generation seems to be characterized as generally depressed with a
bored attitude of *its ok, i'll get over it". The primary theme there is some
form of muted (apathetic) emotional resiliency, where mute suggests a primary
characterization that is unintentionally not primarily communicated. These
sort of characterizations suggest something that is not fragile, but not
something that is socially exciting.

Millennial generation on the other hand appears to be characterized by maximum
inclusion and interconnectedness, which are great... until people are cut off,
which is characterized for its stark fragility.

Those are stereotypes and are prone to being wildly inaccurate with respect to
any particular group or subculture, but still its interesting to compare those
two demographics by solely looking at the representative media. During Gen X
grunge, gangster rap, and country music were wildly popular. The really big
deal in my area was Nine Inch Nails which was horribly depressing. Shows like
Roseanne, Married with Children, and Beavis and Butthead were all the rage
which mostly featured primary characters sitting on a couch complaining and
getting over it. Also remember the Simpsons were far more depressing in their
first few seasons during that period of time.

Media also reflects the stereotypes for the Millennial generation as well. The
popular shows of the late 90s and early 2000s were things like Friends,
Seinfeld, Sex and the City, Grey's Anatomy, and 30 Rock. These were all
friends spending time with each other being happy, and aside from 30 Rock,
none of those people ever seemed to go to work. Work is boring and depressing.
The biggest things in music during the early years of the Millennial
generation were most pop bands that graduated from boy bands or young
attractive female pop singers. The theme was be beautiful, happy, and
connected, but the moment you weren't connected the rest of it seemed to fall
apart.

Comparing the two generations it seems Gen Xers are living an emotional coma
enjoying all that numbs them to, while Millennials are living with bipolar
disorder.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennials](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennials)

------
valuearb
Another example of the myth of the omnipotence of marketing messages.

Marketing only works when the product works. Coke works because most peoples
first experience is good, not only good, but in many cases magical (kids
who've never had caffeine, especially combined in a tasty high sugar drink).
Coke advertising just has to trigger memories of the happiness of that
original taste association, and the marketing director looks like a genius.

Then he tries to make his own products, and the feathers on his gawdy wings
start to smoke.

------
skibz
> OK Soda may be the preferred drink of other people such as yourself.

I love this! Is it a novel piece of copywriting, or a play/parody of
something?

~~~
dhritzkiv
Perhaps an allusion to non-mainstream demographics?

------
Noxmiles
Perfect marketing for 2020. Hope they'll reboot it soon.

"The drink's slogan was 'Things are going to be OK.'"

------
crazygringo
Well hey, the branding worked for OkCupid.

The site's not trying to be an _amazing_ Cupid. Just an OK one. ;)

------
petetnt
It's blowing my mind that these had Clowes/Burns artwork on them!

------
improv32
Weird to see my tiny hometown (Lynden, WA) was used as a test market

------
ben_w
Here in Berlin there is an energy drink branded “ok.-“

~~~
jackson1way
Here is the link with pictures
[https://www.okpunktstrich.de/](https://www.okpunktstrich.de/)

Not too exciting. They also have chocolate and strawberry drinks :-)

------
spanktheuser
I was working in college radio and writing for The Onion back when OK Cola
came out. I think the money that went into this makes most sense framed as a
type of generational panic combined with technological transformation. The
early Gen Xers were entering the workforce with a set of behaviors / values
that felt unfamiliar & perhaps threatening to Boomers. Boomers began to feel
uncool, out of touch and no longer culturally adept in the way they always had
previously. This is nothing new, but I think it might be particularly
wrenching when it finally happens to a demographically large and dominant
cohort. Millennials, let me know how it works out.

More importantly rapid changes in technology caused corporations to lose
control of media distribution for the first time. Widespread availability of
personal computers / microchips caused media creation and distribution costs
plummet in publishing, music, and film production/distribution. New insurgents
like Fantagraphics, hip hop, college radio, indie rock, The Onion, The
Stranger, Might, indie record labels and indie movies could route around large
corporations to find an audience and build a business. Capital was still
needed, but was orders of magnitude less than it had been for prior
generations.

The resulting panic was deepest in the industries connected to entertainment,
including those that depended on it for marketing. It seems absurd, but
consumer brands convinced themselves that not only would Xers reject
traditional media & advertising - they’d reject the previous generations
products as well. There was sincere worry that millions of kids would stop
drinking Coke & Miller Lite. Ad agencies helped fuel this panic as it brought
with it an opportunity to pry large accounts away from incumbents.

This period didn’t last long, but it did birth a number of experiments like OK
Cola, most of which were conceived as experiments and strategic contingency
plans. For a brief and shining moment, there was some decent money and
cultural cachet showered upon a bunch of smirking early 20s Xers whose only
qualifications were helming a late night college radio program. It was
wonderful to see Daniel Clowes, Charles Burns and other generation-defining
artists get some well-earned money if not recognition.

------
thre2ewr4234
For a moment there I wondered if George from Seinfeld had created a virtual
assistant :D

~~~
shrimp_emoji
I've watched all of Seinfeld and I don't get this reference :D

------
mark-r
Despite being in one of the test market areas, I don't remember this at all.

------
beams_of_light
I remember being so proud of my OK Soda hat that I won in a can at school.

Good memories.

------
krzyk
Design of OK Soda looks quite similar to Fallout Nuka Cola

------
andai
> OK Soda's concept was that the youth market was already aware that they were
> being manipulated by mass-media marketing, so this advertising campaign
> would just be more transparent about it.

~~~
samizdis
It reminds me of a catchline for 7-Up, spoken by the cartoon character Fido
Dido (late-80s?): "More a can of drink than a way of life."

------
MivLives
I have a hobby of trying odd sodas. This one was on my list with New Coke,
Crystal Pepsi, Surge and Orbitz as things I'd never get to try.

That list has gotten smaller over time as Crystal Pepsi and Surge got mass
rereleases, and New Coke got rereleased last summer.

Orbitz I believe said that they no longer have the machinery to make the balls
but I have no source on that.

Come on Coke, rerelease OK Soda. Tie it in with OK Boomer for all I care.

------
mclightning
Am I the only one feeling this has a weird resemblance to "OK Boomer" in its
nonchalant attitude?

~~~
DonHopkins
The "Soda Generation" is the generic version of the "Pepsi Generation".

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepsi_Generation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepsi_Generation)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po0jY4WvCIc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po0jY4WvCIc)

French Firm Targets "Soda Generation" With Cola-Flavored Wine

[https://www.beveragedaily.com/Article/2013/06/28/French-
firm...](https://www.beveragedaily.com/Article/2013/06/28/French-firm-targets-
soda-generation-with-cola-flavored-wine)

------
mjfl
If I drink this soda will I become haunted like the guy on the can? lol

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OK_Soda#/media/File:OK_Soda_-_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OK_Soda#/media/File:OK_Soda_-
_can.jpg)

