Coca-Cola’s iconic contour bottle is celebrating its 100th year. To mark the occasion Coca-Cola South Pacific today announced the kickoff of a new campaign to celebrate 100 years of the iconic Coca-Cola Contour bottle, with a major multimillion-dollar marketing push hitting the Australian market on Sunday.
The six-month celebration of the famous Contour bottle in Australia starts in June, with new look packaging featuring specially designed Contour bottle inspired imagery across the entire Coca-Cola trademark range (Coke, diet Coke, Coke Zero & Coke Life). The celebrations will conclude in December with a Bottle Art exhibition in Sydney.
One hundred years ago, the Coca-Cola Bottle was created with unmistakable curves and a distinctive contour. The result of a design brief that called for the package to be “so distinctive that it could be recognised by touch alone and so unique it could be identified when shattered on the ground”, the Coca-Cola Bottle remains an icon at 100 years and continues to inspire the world today.
Drawing on globally developed creative, the Australian campaign titled ‘Pop Art’, takes bold and vibrant reimaged images of the Contour bottle to visually transform the brand giving it a new modern look. The Contour Pop Art campaign marks the first time the full trademark has appeared together to include the newly launched Coke Life.
James Somerville, Vice President of Design at The Coca-Cola Company said: “We approached creative minds from around the world and asked them to recreate iconic Coca-Cola artwork from the last 100 years. We wanted to celebrate our past while simultaneously writing our future through design. The final selected pieces of artwork both surprised and delighted us with their diversity and authenticity. We’re excited for everyone to see these beautiful celebrations of the iconic Coca-Cola bottle as they appear as part of the global museum tour.”
The multimillion dollar campaign includes a new TVC featuring the Pop Art images animated to a reworked version of Wham!’s hit ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go Go’, which goes live 28 June. The campaign also includes major new Point of Sale material; customer specific ‘Gift with Purchase’ promotions; digital media including homepage takeovers, 3D displays and more; high profile OOH including large formats and consecutive panels bringing the Coke family of brands together in one location. Major PR activity telling the Contour story through earned media, cutting edge content pushed out through owned social channels and experiential all work to round out the campaign over the following months.
Finally, the campaign culminates with the arrival of a Bottle Art exhibition in Sydney in November, which is currently touring the world and features millions of dollars worth of art. The exhibition titled “The Coca-Cola Bottle Art Tour: Inspiring Pop Culture for 100 Years,” will take consumers on a unique, multi-sensory journey celebrating the bottle’s muse-like role. The exhibition, which will visit more than 15 countries and travel 62,000 miles throughout 2015, will showcase pieces featuring the Coca-Cola bottle produced by 20+ multidisciplinary artists — from icons like Andy Warhol, Norman Rockwell and Clive Barker, to up-and-coming artists and graphic designers — plus historical artefacts and interactive experiences that showcase the bottle’s imprint on the art world and pop culture. The tour, which is free and open to the public, kicked off in Cape Town, South Africa, in February and concludes in Sydney, Australia, on the 23rd November 2015.