A couple of weeks ago while having lunch in a restaurant in Loja, I spotted these Coca-Cola bottles on the bar. Not having seen them before, I asked if I could have a closer look and the manager gave me a bottle to take away. I realise that I am somewhat behind the curve here as they have apparently been around for a while, Coca-Cola having taken the decision some time ago to market their traditional product to their consumers in a completely different way. Obviously manufactured with an eye towards the modern ideal of convenience in everything, these allow you to add a touch of cocktail sophistication to your liquid spirits with the minimum of effort. In a calculated ploy to schmooze their consumers, their marketing department puts it a little more grandly:
“We not only wanted to elevate our brand but also to provide choices that pair with and enhance the drinking experience of premium dark liquors. We also realized that in order to create something super sophisticated, we needed to look outward and partner with some of the world’s most innovative mixologists from across Europe in order to gain insights into what consumers really want and how we can offer the ultimate choice in the bar or at home.”
The design detail which is interesting is that this product is contained in a sleek Hutchinson glass bottle. Coca-Cola’s shapely Contour Bottle is instantly recognisable and is the first bottle design ever to be registered. However, when they were introduced in 1906, the original Coca-Cola bottles were straight-sided and sealed with Hutchinson Stoppers. These proved problematic and were replaced with crown caps as they became available, for this reason the straight-sided Coke bottles are still known as Hutchinson Bottles. With a degree of taste and insight, this bottle was re-introduced by Coca-Cola in 2019 for the Signature Mixers range and cashes in, not for the first time, on the wave of nostalgia which surrounds the Coca-Cola brand.