was in their own television commercial. You’re in the moment, you’re drinking the product, you have that emotional context that sets it. And Coke really came to have a very high share of those experiences. It was about having a ubiquitous presence. Inside Coke, it is called the ‘ubiquity strategy.’ In simple terms, Mr. Woodruff’s words for that were: ‘Put the product within an arm’s reach of desire.’ ” This helped turn the soda into much more than a product. To the envy of every food company on earth, Coke became the most powerful
brand
in the world—a brand that was deeply rooted in people’s psyches, able to generate staggering heights of consumer loyalty.
As Coke’s sales doubled and tripled and kept going up—along with those of Pepsi and other soft drinks—so too did America’s inclination to overindulge. In nutrition circles, where the causes of obesity are discussed, there is no single product—among the sixty thousand items sold in the grocery store—that is considered more evil, more directly responsible for the crisis than soda. The problem, as growing numbers of nutritionists see it, is not the calories in soda, though calories are ultimately what causes us to gain weight. Rather, it’s their form: Research suggests that our bodies are less aware of excessive intake when the calories are liquid. Health advocates don’t blame the single can of Coke with its roughly nine teaspoons of sugar. What made Coke evil—or, depending on who you are talking to, wildly successful—was the supersizing. As the obesity crisis was buildingin the 1980s, those cans gave way to 20-ounce bottles, with 15 teaspoons of sugar; liter bottles, with 26 teaspoons; and the 64-ounce Double Gulp sold by the 7-Eleven stores, with 44 teaspoons of sugar. Beyond the size of each serving, Coke’s success came from the numbers of these cans and bottles and cups that people, especially kids, were drinking every day.By 1995, two in three kids were drinking a 20-ounce bottle daily, but this was merely the national average. At Coca-Cola, executives didn’t speak of “customers” or even “consumers.”They talked about “heavy users,” people with a habit of two or more cans per day. As Dunn’s career stretched into its second decade, the numbers of these heavy users was only going up.
In pursuing this massive consumption,Dunn rose nearly to the top of the company. He became president for North and South America, a job that entailed winning the brand loyalty of nine hundred million people. He lived Coke and loved his work and the company, a devotion shared by many at Coke, and for all those years he had no qualms about what he sold. He achieved this peace of mind, he said, by simply not thinking about what he sold. Rather, he thought only about the selling, and the selling was great, until it wasn’t anymore. This moment came one day in 2001 when his lieutenants took him to a part of the world that excited them like no other: Brazil. The economy there was booming, and the population there had the potential to match the soda consumption levels in the United States; Coke only had to show them the way. As Dunn toured some of the targeted neighborhoods, he felt his stomach sink. Suddenly, the kids there, along with the kids in the United States, seemed so unfairly lured, so helpless in the face of the company’s tactics, so utterly vulnerable to the addictive powers of Coke, that Dunn decided his company had gone too far. After trying over the next four years to steer the company back to saner nutritional policies, he resigned. For the first time since then, he agreed to discuss some of the company’s deepest secrets that ultimately led to his own deepest regrets.
Jeffrey Dunn is no ordinary whistleblower. He doesn’t look back on his time at Coke with bitterness, nor does he view his former colleagues as evil. Rather, he said, they are blinded by the desire to win.“At Coke, I dothink they believe they are doing
brand
in the world—a brand that was deeply rooted in people’s psyches, able to generate staggering heights of consumer loyalty.
As Coke’s sales doubled and tripled and kept going up—along with those of Pepsi and other soft drinks—so too did America’s inclination to overindulge. In nutrition circles, where the causes of obesity are discussed, there is no single product—among the sixty thousand items sold in the grocery store—that is considered more evil, more directly responsible for the crisis than soda. The problem, as growing numbers of nutritionists see it, is not the calories in soda, though calories are ultimately what causes us to gain weight. Rather, it’s their form: Research suggests that our bodies are less aware of excessive intake when the calories are liquid. Health advocates don’t blame the single can of Coke with its roughly nine teaspoons of sugar. What made Coke evil—or, depending on who you are talking to, wildly successful—was the supersizing. As the obesity crisis was buildingin the 1980s, those cans gave way to 20-ounce bottles, with 15 teaspoons of sugar; liter bottles, with 26 teaspoons; and the 64-ounce Double Gulp sold by the 7-Eleven stores, with 44 teaspoons of sugar. Beyond the size of each serving, Coke’s success came from the numbers of these cans and bottles and cups that people, especially kids, were drinking every day.By 1995, two in three kids were drinking a 20-ounce bottle daily, but this was merely the national average. At Coca-Cola, executives didn’t speak of “customers” or even “consumers.”They talked about “heavy users,” people with a habit of two or more cans per day. As Dunn’s career stretched into its second decade, the numbers of these heavy users was only going up.
In pursuing this massive consumption,Dunn rose nearly to the top of the company. He became president for North and South America, a job that entailed winning the brand loyalty of nine hundred million people. He lived Coke and loved his work and the company, a devotion shared by many at Coke, and for all those years he had no qualms about what he sold. He achieved this peace of mind, he said, by simply not thinking about what he sold. Rather, he thought only about the selling, and the selling was great, until it wasn’t anymore. This moment came one day in 2001 when his lieutenants took him to a part of the world that excited them like no other: Brazil. The economy there was booming, and the population there had the potential to match the soda consumption levels in the United States; Coke only had to show them the way. As Dunn toured some of the targeted neighborhoods, he felt his stomach sink. Suddenly, the kids there, along with the kids in the United States, seemed so unfairly lured, so helpless in the face of the company’s tactics, so utterly vulnerable to the addictive powers of Coke, that Dunn decided his company had gone too far. After trying over the next four years to steer the company back to saner nutritional policies, he resigned. For the first time since then, he agreed to discuss some of the company’s deepest secrets that ultimately led to his own deepest regrets.
Jeffrey Dunn is no ordinary whistleblower. He doesn’t look back on his time at Coke with bitterness, nor does he view his former colleagues as evil. Rather, he said, they are blinded by the desire to win.“At Coke, I dothink they believe they are doing
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