Diet Coke returns to personalisation with new look cans

Diet Coke has launched cans and bottles with 150 different names on them, meaning many consumers will be able to pick up a personalised pack in store.

The aim of the new packs is to “elevate Diet Coke Breaks”. Each pack has the Diet Coke trademark on it as usual, but also the words “Break”. The full pack front reads: “Diet Coke Break by [name].”

The initiative, launched today (10 July), is reminiscent of Coca-Cola’s famous ‘Share a Coke’ campaign from 2011, which ran across Coca-Cola bottles and cans, replacing the brand name with consumers’ names in the brand’s signature typeface.

The Share a Coke campaign was credited with giving Coca-Cola a sales boost. The brand’s volume sales (number of litres sold) leapt 2.9% year-over-year to 272.17 million in the three months after it was launched in the UK (ending 23 June 2013), according to data from IRI (now known as Circana).

Initial demand pushed sales up to £682.13m for the 52 weeks to 20 July 2013, according to IRI, as the brand drove sales of higher value single bottles. Such was the size of the campaign that in 2014 Coke claimed its Share a Coke ads had been seen by 94% of the population 20 times over the summer period.

However, despite an initial boost, the campaign did not deliver a continuous sales uplift for the brand.

Coca-Cola sales not fizzing as too few ‘Share a Coke’

The new Diet Coke Break campaign is only running across Diet Coke packs, rather than across Coca-Cola and Coca-Cola Zero – as was the case with Share a Coke.

For consumers unable to find their name on a pack in store, Diet Coke is offering 4,000 opportunities to win a personalised can by scanning a QR code and downloading the Coca-Cola app to enter.

To celebrate the release of the new personalised packs, Diet Coke will also be opening pop-up spaces in London and Manchester offering the chance to book an appointment for Diet Coke-themed nail art.

Diet Coke has been pushing its Diet Coke Break message since earlier this year when it launched new brand platform ‘Love What You Love, By You’.

Coca-Cola GB and Ireland marketing director Louise Maugest explains the initiative is about making Diet Coke Breaks into something “even more special”.

Speaking to Marketing Week in 2022 on the celebration of Diet Coke’s 40th anniversary, Maugest explained her belief future growth will come from creating “meaningful” relationships with loyal customers.

“There’s so much we can do to keep engaging with our loyal fans and consumers and take the brand forward in that way,” she said. “We can really create a kind of meaningful connection between the brand and our consumers.”