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Coca-Cola is hoping that this vacation season, households will crack open some Cokes, settle into a snug spot and watch its first Christmas Anthology movie sequence.
The beverage firm partnered with manufacturing agency Imagine Entertainment to create three brief movies, which can be found to observe on Amazon Prime throughout the globe beginning Wednesday.
The enterprise is a continuation of Coca-Cola’s Real Magic platform, which takes an experimental method to advertising the corporate’s core product.
In the previous yr, Real Magic has centered on uncommon, limited-time flavors similar to Starlight, Byte and Dreamworld, which have been launched alongside digital experiences together with a holographic live performance and a debut in Fortnite. The Christmas Anthology is a part of a brand new platform known as Real Magic Presents.
For Coca-Cola
(KO), it’s essential to do extra than simply promote soda — the soda big has to attach with youthful shoppers and construct new traditions, particularly as curiosity in sugary, carbonated gentle drinks stagnates.
“We’re always exploring new ways to reach our audience,” stated Selman Careaga, class president of Coca-Cola trademark, calling Christmas “a great canvas for creativity.” The anthology, he stated, is “a new way to engage” with the vacation.
Coca-Cola has a historical past of associating itself with Christmas, a lot in order that the corporate has an FAQ web page for “Did Coca-Cola create Santa Claus?” (The reply: Sort of. In 1931, the corporate commissioned a portray of Santa that aligns with how he’s portrayed within the US at present, based on the web page.)
In newer years, the corporate’s polar bears and brightly-lit vans have been strongly linked with the vacation.
This yr, Coke is making an attempt one thing slightly extra high-concept.
After launching the Real Magic platform in 2021, Coca-Cola revealed a video on YouTube known as “Real Magic at Christmas,” a couple of boy who bonds together with his new neighbors by working collectively to construct a chimney out of cardboard bins.
This yr, the brief movies are longer — operating between 10 and 12 minutes — and extra formidable.
There’s “Alma,” which exhibits a single mother who has cooled on Christmas being reminded of the enjoyment of the vacation by a sentient laptop; “Les Petits Mondes De Noël,” a moody love story about two exes who reunite in Paris; and “Christmas Bites,” a couple of vampire who wins over his girlfriend’s household when he steps in for Santa on Christmas Eve.
A viewer wouldn’t essentially know that these are Coca-Cola motion pictures, apart from the truth that every movie options at the least one character sipping a Coke.
But for the corporate, the shorts are about extra than simply product placement. “It allows us to work on content that fits into our Real Magic platform,” stated Careaga.
The movies usually are not your typical tacky Christmas film, and never solely as a result of they’re shorts. There are not any overt love tales, fats snowflakes swirling round faux units or ugly sweaters (at the least, not too many).
The Hallmark mannequin could also be fashionable within the United States, however it doesn’t essentially have international enchantment, stated Marc Gilbar, EVP of manufacturers and documentaries at Imagine Entertainment.
“I mentioned Hallmark films” to members of the worldwide group engaged on the venture, Gilbar stated. “That shorthand doesn’t mean much to someone in Spain or someone in Argentina. It’s more centered on our traditions.”
The Coca-Cola anthology is designed to enchantment to a world viewers. “Alma,” set in Mexico, is in Spanish, and “Les Petits Mondes De Noël,” is in French. Only “Christmas Bites” is in English.
And though these are actually Christmas motion pictures, they’re not overtly non secular.
“Christmas means different things to different people,” Gilbar stated. “The religious aspect never really came up. It was more about other traditions.”
As Coke dips its toes in film-making, rival Pepsi took one other method, partnering with “Falling for Christmas” star Lindsay Lohan to advertise Pilk, or Pepsi plus milk, as a vacation custom.