As my readers may know, I rarely use a picture which is not my own as a "random picture", but this comes courtesy of Coca-Cola Japan. No, this is not a "funky vending machine", but rather an ingeniously modified machine placed in front of a shop in Shibamata, Tokyo. I don't know if this was inspired in any way by the fact that Shibamata is located in Katsushika, a place which hosts the home of the headquarters of toy manufacturer Tomy.
Though much of this modification is done above and beside the machine, some of it is in front and, in theory, could impede access to the machine because of the way the blocky "feet" stick out. I couldn't help but wonder if such a modification in the U.S. might cause some consternation and a demand to return it to its former state. I thought it was cool that Coca-cola Japan displayed this picture rather than became angry about the way in which their machine had been altered.
This picture is courtesy of Coca-Cola and it's not a product announcement because the contents are nothing new. This is a limited edition design for cans sold only in Okinawa. It's a limited edition, so it won't be around forever. The illustration is of hibiscus flowers and they are apparently quite popular in the region as part of gardens and parks. They are not originally from the area as the plants were brought over from China and transplanted there.
I'm not using this picture because I want to give botany lessons. The truth is that the only thing I've ever successfully grown is green onions which pretty much thrive if you put them in a glass of water and leave them alone. I'm using this picture because the can is pretty. :-)
Return with me now to those thrilling days of yesteryear when Japanese people were flocking to designer bags like a goose to a fat juicy moth. There was a time when people had money to splash about for Louis Vuitton bags or purchasing a trivial bit of real estate like Rockefeller Center. It seems that someone at Coca-cola Japan would like us to forget about the 20+ year economic decline and promote like it's 1989.
The bag pictured above is the same size and shape as a can of Coke and opens with a clasp that works like a pop-top. It's covered in swanky Swarovski crystals. There's a limit to a mere 2,500 of them worldwide, but you can have one for 289,800 yen ($2,957.90) because who doesn't think it's worth nearly three grand to carry around a supremely tacky coke can bag?
On the more practical side, it has a serial number so you are actually looking at something that could be considered a collectible with potential future value. That being said, if the initial price is so insanely high, there's a low chance that the value will increase much over time.
As an aside, I ran across a couple of Swarovski shops in Tokyo. They were both pretty tacky looking from the outside with a bunch of what looked like mirrored stalactites hanging from the front of the shop. It was as if the designers were caught in a time warp that froze them in the 80's style.
One of the clients which my company dealt with when I was working in Japan was a maker and distributor of vending machines. Prior to the March 11, 2011 earthquake, their main concerns were maintenance, distribution, and making the machines appealing to use relative to purchasing in shops. For example, they would build in little games that would reward people for buying a drink on rare occasions. They worked on the same principle as a slot machine, only with fewer wins.
After the big quake, setsuden, or energy conservation kicked in so that the nuclear reactors could be shut down and setsucden continues to this day so they can continue to keep them out of operation. When I spoke to employees of the client that made such machines later in 2011, their main focus shifted entirely to finding ways to keep drinks in the machines cold or hot while reducing the energy use. They were worried that the number of total machines would be reduced if they didn't lower energy consumption. If you make vending machines, the last thing you want is for fewer of them to be in use.
A man puts up a sign talking about Coke's power consumption efforts.
One of the ways in which they accomplished this was by using LED lights, using better insulation and by reducing refrigeration during certain times. They rotate turning off the machine for 3 minutes during peak hours. Apparently, their attempts to reduce the energy footprint were so successful that they have been awarded the energy conservation grand prize. This may not sound like a big deal, but there are a lot of vending machines in Japan and the aggregate savings not only helps cope with the diminished capacity to supply energy, but also lowers Japan's carbon footprint. Every little bit, especially on the corporate level, counts, and they've reduced the energy their machines use by 33%. (Let us all collectively pat, Coca-cola Japan on the back for a job well done.)
Though it may seem that they have done nothing but toil on energy reduction engineering, they're continuing to try to find ways to make using the machines more fun. To that end, Coca-Cola Japan has introduced an AR "apply" (app) that allows smart phone users to have an "augmented reality" (AR) experience with a vending machine. That would be a lot more scintillating if the vending machines were dispensing marital aids or adult materials, but what kind of AR would make using a Coke machine better?
This is a video showing some of the capability of the AR app for smartphones when used with a Coke machine. By the way, at the very end, I believe the guy holding up the hats is trying to say, "coming soon" in English, but I could be wrong. It comes across as very garbled to me.
It turns out that the bonus is that you can interact with the cute little polar bear graphic on the machine using your smart phone. If you touch him in various spots (and I know what you're thinking you perverts), he'll sneeze, giggle, etc. You can also see commercials for a few of the products stocked in the machine because, you know, you would like more chances to view advertising.
Coke makes a big to-do about choosing the polar bear image because it is a symbol for the effects of global warming. However, the polar bear has been in Coke ads since long before anyone ever started talking about climate change. Though there is a connection to melting polar ice caps, I think the real reason is that they're just so darn adorable that they're hoping you'll want to install their app so you can rub his tummy and watch him laugh.
One thing that you have to love about Asian countries is that their copyright lawyers are sitting around twiddling their thumbs. It seems that you can get away with knocking off nearly anything in Asia without concern for stepping on some company's trademark if the number of products that closely resemble various brands are any indication.
This cola, made by Cheerio, is not only a blatant design rip-off of Tabasco brand pepper sauce, but it even goes so far as to put a disclaimer on the bottle that tacitly acknowledges its theft. The yellow banner across the bottom of the bottle says, "this isn't sauce!" The name in Japanese, "nanchatte" also indicates that this is all a big joke since that is used in Japanese to say, "just kidding!" So, this isn't sauce. Ha, ha!
Given the cheesy knock-off nature of this product, I bypassed it for months. I only gave in when I saw it at Don Quixote for the low price of 39 yen (42 cents). I figured that it was worth that much for being able to talk about it, even if I knew there was virtually no chance that I'd drink at 154 calories per 350 ml. (the whole bottle).
The bottle is transparent, so you can see that this cola comes without the usual caramel coloring of things like Pepsi and Coke. It's a dark pink which makes the experience a bit odder. I expect pink to taste like fruit, but this smells and tastes like off-brand or second-rate cola. The closest thing it resembles is RC Cola in the U.S. The main difference between brand-name cola and cheaper versions is the lack of depth of flavor. Things like Pepsi and Coke have a variety of flavorings. This just tastes like a wet, carbonated version of cola candies. It's not bad, but it's not great.
On October 26, Coke released yet another version of its expanding "plus" line of no calorie beverages. Though I've only reviewed the green tea version, I have tried the version with Vitamin C, and I wasn't a fan. That being said, I wasn't offended by it. I just am not a huge fan of the lemon with Coke flavor that is in it.
If you live in Japan, you might realize that the Coke Plus line of drinks is a way of more directly competing with Pepsi Nex. First, there was Coke light with 50% of the calories of regular Coke. Pepsi introduced zero calorie Diet Pepsi so Coke finally came out with zero calorie Diet Coke (Coke light is part of history now). Now, they sell Coke Zero. Then Pepsi came out with a diet lemon-flavored version called Pepsi Nex and Coke countered with this stuff. It's interesting that Coke is constantly playing catch-up with Pepsi in Japan when it's the reverse in the U.S.
Though I didn't care for the lemon Diet Coke that is Coke Plus, the fact that this has fiber hooked me in. I paid 147 yen for this at 7-11 because I imagined I'd pour this into a glass and see little bits of grain floating around in it. Of course, that's not the way it is. It's more like Metamucil has been dissolved in it, I'd guess. It looks like normal Coke, has the mouth feel of, and smells like Coke with a twist of artificial lemon.
This isn't awful, but the difference between this, Coke Plus with Vitamin C and even Green Tea Coke is practically non-existent. There's a Simpsons episode about the making of "Duff beer" where they show the beer pouring down three pipes into different containers. The pipes says "regular Duff", "Duff Dry" and "Duff Light", but the liquid pouring into the pipes is coming from the same central barrel/vat. This image came to mind after sampling this Coke Plus. It's as if Coke is pouring the same stuff into different bottles.
If for some strange reason you'd like a desktop picture with Sarah Jessica Parker hawking Diet Coke beverages or the design on the bottles, you can download them here.
You'd think that living in Japan would mean I'd be right on top of every new release, but the truth is that one would have to make it a priority to stroll through every aisle of a convenience store on a daily basis to see new items or keep an eye on the news of new releases in Japan. I'm too busy for the former and too lazy for the latter. The truth is that I was completely unaware of this new green tea Coke until Marvo at The Impulsive Buy brought it to my attention. It's because of him that I sauntered down to the local Family Mart and bought three bottles (one for me, two for him) and that you're seeing this review in such a timely fashion.
I didn't realize it when I first looked at this, but this Coke is meant to appeal to the type of people who will buy junk food that has been "enhanced" to make it healthier. It's "Coke Plus" for starters, not "Diet Coke" or "Coke Zero". Coke Plus is the ugly stepchild to the other calorie-free Cokes. It has vitamins or minerals or some such crap added to it such that it has a weird aftertaste. I tried Coke Plus once, and decided that I'd never allow it to darken the doorway to my taste buds again.
The "catechin" is supposed to be the "plus" in this whereas the "plus" in the more commonly available Coke Plus is Vitamin C. Catechin is supposed to reduce your chances of developing cancer or hardened arteries. I'm guessing that you'd be lucky if the catechin in a bottle of this canceled out your chances of developing cancer from the artificial sweeteners in it.
The first ingredient in this is green tea extract followed by caramel flavor and then another type of green tea acidulant flavoring (which adds a sharpness to the flavor). Other ingredients include both of the artificial sweeteners aspartame and Sucralose. You'd expect it to be bursting at the seams with green tea taste given the ingredients list, but taking a whiff of it doesn't really reveal much except an off-brand cola smell. The first several sips also didn't overwhelm me with tea flavor, but as I drank more, there was more and more of a sense of the grassy flavor that comes along with green tea. Halfway through the bottle, it became increasingly more pronounced. It's as if I had to build up a sensitivity to the flavor to detect it more clearly.
The sense I got from this is that it carries the basic flavor of green tea, but without any trace of its trademark bitterness. This gives it a strange flavor which seems reminiscent of Stevia. It's like a grassy, malt flavor. I'm not sure that a green tea aficionado would recognize what this is as actual green tea taste, but I'm pretty sure a Coca-Cola fan would recognize that something was not quite right with it.
This certainly was not bad at all. If I were in the market for a calorie-free Cola and couldn't buy regular Diet Coke or Coke Zero, I'd buy this without fear that I would find it unpalatable. I'd take this over the Coke Plus with Vitamin C for certain. However, I don't see this as particularly special or appealing and it'd definitely be second to a regular plain old Diet Coke. Unlike Pepsi's weird flavors, Coke seems to be attempting to make something more subtle and palatable.
Note that there is currently a contest going on with all Coca-Cola beverages where numbers in the cap can be used to win J-League (Japan Soccer League) shirts and other bits of flotsam if you're inclined to fill your life with useless possessions. You have to go to the contest web site and enter your numbers and manage in Japanese, and you have to care enough to bother.
