So I was cruising the Coke aisle at the all-new non-Ghetto Kroger on Saturday when I noticed something new – Coca-Cola Zero.
I pondered the likely difference between the un-caloried Zero, regular Diet Coke and Diet Coke with Splenda (let”s not drag Tab into this) when I noticed the Coke guy wheeling in a pallet of Fridge Packs. So I just asked him what the deal is with Coca-Cola Zero.
Zero, he told me, is based on the original Coca-Cola formula, unlike Diet Coke – which I believe is based on the original Draino formula.
I tried Diet Coke with Splenda a few weeks ago, and it sucks. Hard. At the time, the wife said DCS tastes like regular Coke, which is why I didn”t like it (having fully adjusted to the Draino goodness of Diet Coke). Not really remembering what real Coca-Cola tastes like, I took her word for it.
But I decided to give Zero a try.
Holy Jesus is that stuff good. This is what a “diet” Coca-Cola should be. It”s got the cola heft of regular Coke and the aspartame twang of Diet Coke. For whatever reason, they didn”t go Splenda here.
I drank nine of them in a 24-hour period.
Only after having Zero did I realize that Pepsi One must be based on the regular Pepsi formula, which is what makes it different than Diet Pepsi [editor"s note: you couldn"t have paid me to drink a regular Pepsi back in my sugared-Coke days, but I don"t see much different in the diets.]
But when I hit the Coca-Cola Zero site, I discovered they didn”t make this drink for me.
According to the site, Zero is for “consumers who are looking for real Coca-Cola taste with zero calories and who are not consumers of current diet CSDs [carbonated soda drinks?]“. I guess they aren”t checking this requirement yet, as I was able to purchase a Fridge Pack of Diet Coke with Lime at the same time.
Zero is targeted at “young adults”, who the Coke marketing people say have told them they want “a new brand they can call their own.”
Over my dead body, junior. This shit is gooooooood, and if I have to put my baseball cap on backwards and put some 50-cent in my iPod to buy it, I”m there.