15 Events in the Shady History of Coca-Cola
![15 Events in the Shady History of Coca-Cola](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/8/2/861982_320x180.jpg)
This book contains a list of things that are true. That's all you need to know about it. If you enjoy this list of interesting facts, or even if you don't, I hope you will have the good grace to move on without wasting any more of your time on the next two pages. I'm a big fan of lists. I love reading lists, and I love writing them. In fact, I have written dozens of lists over the last twenty-five years, and I'm just getting around to putting them together in a mammoth compendium of all the things that I have ever found amusing. The list you are reading now is the first one to be published. I am so excited about it, I am almost shaking with excitement. I enjoy this list of interesting facts so much that I am tempted to share it with you even though I'm not quite done with it yet. I do hope you will be patient. This is going to take me a while.
Sinaltrainal v. Coca-Cola
![Sinaltrainal v. Coca-Cola ORIGINAL TASTE ОРИГІНАЛЬНИЙ CMAK Coca-Cola 250 It's generally a bad look to have a section on your Wikipedia page labeled Colombian death-squad allegations, which refers in Coke's case to a 1996 incident at a Colombian bottling plant where an armed militia killed a union lead- er, destroyed the union hall, and forced employ- ees to quit at gunpoint so they could be replaced with much cheaper workers. The workers sued the company for indirect responsibility, but Co- ca-Cola was never found to be connected to the militia, although it worked out pretty well for them and they](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/7/861997.jpg)
They Wanted to Stay in Russia
![They Wanted to Stay in Russia While other companies tripped over each other in their haste to pull out of Russia during its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Coke stood firm, refusing to close down their Russian facilities. Only the threat of massive boycotts convinced them to change their tune just two days later. See a pattern? CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/9/861999.jpg)
They Pay Scientists to Say Coke is Healthy
![They Pay Scientists to Say Coke is Healthy In 2015, it was found that Coca-Cola had provided millions of dollars in funding to scientists with the Global Energy Balance Network. That's nice, right? Well, it wasn't entirely altruistic: The organization's chief contribution to the discourse has been insisting that exercise is the key to health, not diet, which suits Coca-Cola quite nicely. So nicely, in fact, that they ve paid for the only studies they cite to prove that. Coke has even been caught paying nu- tritionists to promote their products as healthy snacks. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/8/861998.jpg)
Their Animal Testing Was Exceptionally Horrific
![Their Animal Testing Was Exceptionally Horrific It's a sad fact of modern capitalism that many corporations have a history of - or even continue to perform --animal test- ing, but Coca-Cola's was like something about of a dystopian novel. One study in- volved cutting open the faces of chim- panzees to study nerve impulses used in the perception of sweet tastes. Having apparently realized there are other ways to test that (or it's just not worth it to go Face/Off on some monkeys just to find out people like sweet things), the compa- ny pledged to cease unnecessary animal testing in 2007.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/6/861996.jpg)
Tapping Into the Education Market
![Tapping Into the Education Market Enjoy! Coca-Cola Coca-Cola Coca-Cola Enjoy Coca-Cola In the '90s, Coca-Cola started tak- ing advantage of underfunded schools by offering lucrative con- tracts for exclusively selling its products in campus vending ma- chines. They even offered sales bonuses or commissions, incentiv- izing schools to pump their kids as full of caffeine as possible if they wanted those textbooks. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/4/861994.jpg)
1990’s Disastrous MagiCans
![1990's Disastrous MagiCans a St a NGT BANKANDO FEWWARD BACK 2 PUL In the summer of 1990, Coke started distribut- ing what they called MagiCans full of prizes instead of sweet, sweet sugar water, spring-loaded to pop out at you when you open the can that also contained foul-smelling chlorinated water to discourage people from drinking from the cans in case a New Kids on the Block ticket in their face didn't do the trick. The cans were completely unmarked so no one would know if it was a regular can of Coke or a cylindrical scratch ticket. Coke somehow](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/5/861995.jpg)
They Got Mixed Up in Apartheid
![They Got Mixed Up in Apartheid THEREDF HAVE BEEN RESERVED FOR THE EXCLUSIVE USE OF WHITE PERSONS. By Order Provincial Secretary VIR GEBRUIK DEUR BLANKES At the height of apartheid in South Africa, Coca-Cola was one of the country's largest employers, leading to boycotts in the '80s. In 1986, they made noises about closing down their South African bottling and can- ning operations, but they never truly left the country, and experts at the time predicted the move would make no financial difference at all to the company. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/3/861993.jpg)
The Real Reason Pepsi Became a Competitor
![The Real Reason Pepsi Became a Competitor In fact, Coca-Cola's troubled history with the black community is the whole reason Pepsi managed to enter the market so successfully in the '40s. They aggressive- ly courted the black dollar, hiring all-black sales teams and placing adver- tisements featuring black entertainers in black publications. It worked so well that by 1968, Coca-Cola was personally flying Martin Luther King, Jr.'s widow to his fu- neral (while still reportedly discriminat- ing against black employees, however). CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/8/9/861989.jpg)
They Only Took The Cocaine Out Because of Racism
![They Only Took The Cocaine Out Because of Racism As for the cocaine, it had already been removed in 1903, but not for any DEA-у reasons. Rumors started to spread that Georgia was beset by black men as- saulting white women in Coke-intoxi- cated frenzies, and Candler wasn't about that bad press, so he removed the cocaine and also cut all ties to black consumers for good measure. Note that Coca-Cola still contains coca leaf ex- tract, it's just had the good stuff re- moved first. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/1/861991.jpg)
Its First Controversy Was About Caffeine
![Its First Controversy Was About Caffeine x N N 27% N O N In 1911, the U.S. government sued Co- ca-Cola to remove a dangerous stimu- lant from its product - not cocaine but caffeine. The trial was a real roller coaster, featuring expert witnesses whose testimony backfired when they said that caffeine was actually fine, a successful argument by Coke that it wasn't a naturally occurring ingredient rather than an additive, and then the swift reversal of that decision. In the end, Coke had to cut its caffeine con- tent in half. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/0/861990.jpg)
Its Next Owner Bought It At a Funeral
![Its Next Owner Bought It At a Funeral By 1887, Pemberton had brought several inves- tors into the Coca-Cola Company as partners, including Asa Candler, a move he would have certainly regretted if he'd lived long enough to see its consequences. After he died the next year, the rights to the name passed on to his widow and the formula to his son, Charley, who was also something of a wayward drug addict. According to legend, Candler bought the name at Pemberton's funeral by offering his dis- traught widow $300 for it, and Charley Pem- berton soon conveniently died of](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/9/2/861992.jpg)
Then It Was Sold As Medicine
![Then It Was Sold As Medicine This INTELLECTUAL BEVERAGE and TEMPERANCE DRINK contains the valuable TONIC and NERVE STIM ULANT properties of the Coca plant and Cola (or Kola) nuts, and makes not only a delicious, exhilarating refreshing and invigorating Beverage, .(dispensed from the soda water fountain or in other carbonated bever hut Brain Tania and CUEA for al Pre-Google society was shockingly dumb and easily wowed by things like bubbles, so they assumed carbonated water was better for you than stupid tap water. Pemberton was quick to seize on this opportunity by marketing Coca-Cola as a medicine, treating and](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/8/8/861988.jpg)
Then It Was Sold As An Alternative to Alcohol
![Then It Was Sold As An Alternative to Alcohol Coca-Cola Pemberton was ever adaptable: Soon after he started selling his coca wine, the Georgia county where he lived out- lawed alcohol consumption, so he sim- ply replaced the wine with a sugar syr- up, changed the name, and created the slogan Coca-Cola: The temperance drink. Keep in mind that it was still to- tally cocaineful, and even now, Co- ca-Cola contains tiny traces of alcohol as a natural byproduct of its manufac- turing processes. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/8/7/861987.jpg)
It Was Intended to Wean People Off Morphine
![It Was Intended to Wean People Off Morphine Pemberton was a Civil War vet who ended up addicted to morphine as a re- sult of his injuries, as did a whole lot of dudes his age, so his initial experiments with drinkable cocaine, which was con- sidered much less harmful, were mostly focused on finding a less gnarly substi- tute for morphine. Considering Coke's enduring popularity at NA meetings and rehab centers, you can't say he was on the wrong path. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/8/6/861986.jpg)
Yes, It Contained Cocaine
![Yes, It Contained Cocaine PEMBERTON'S FRENCH WINE COCA, THE GREAT AND SURE REMEDY This isn't as shady as it sounds: Cocaine was perfectly legal at the time John Pemberton began mar- keting his French Coca Wine in the 1880s. Coca wine - - which is exactly what it sounds like -- was a popular drink at the time, Pem- berton's unique twist being the addition of kola nut, hence its eventual name, Coca-Cola. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/9/8/5/861985.jpg)