Would You Like Some Fail With That?

Consumer behavior in relation to whether or not a product succeeds or fails is intriguing to me. Why can a product take off for no apparent reason and another product fail miserably even when the company may have a pristine reputation? Consumer behavior might hold some of the answers. 

The product I chose came from a company that has experienced tremendous success over several decades and has branded itself so well that they own Christmas. They have experienced so much success that the name of the company...just the name is worth over 83 billion dollars. 

Yet this company introduced a product that was considered to be one of the single greatest flops in consumer history. The company was none other than powerhouse Coca-Cola and its introduction of New Coke. The year was 1985 and Coke was feeling significant pressure from other beverage companies like Pepsi. Coke decided they needed a boost and instead of trying minor re-branding techniques they decided to do a complete product change. They did an incredible amount of research and development and spent a ridiculous amount of money retooling their beloved product. In terms of innovation Coke did an excellent job, so what made everything go so horribly wrong?

It is simple really. They forgot about the consumer. The first mistake they made was during their release press conference. There was no mention of taste testing during their research and development stage. Even worse than that was they forgot to mention why they were even making a change, completely ignoring the consumer. They took the consumer for granted and they payed dearly. Pepsi recognized Coke's misstep and capitalized on it by releasing adds attacking Coke, including full pages in the New York Times. Coke was forced to completely drop the New Coke and revert back to Classic Coke within the year. 

When looking at why this product failed, considering it came from a prominent company, you have to look at the consumer. Coke failed to make the consumer feel included and alienated their fan base. This I believe is the sole reason the new product failed.