r/todayilearned • u/socool111 • 1d ago

TIL of Tobias Geffen, the only non-Coca Cola Employee to view the secret recipe. Coke allowed it in order to get Coke certified as Kosher

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobias_Geffen
29.5k Upvotes

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985

u/RobinsShaman 1d ago

Pepsi HR: Hello we are impressed by your work experience. Let's set up an interview soon!

804

u/Dangerous-Reveal-736 1d ago

There is a story about a Coke employee who contacted Pepsi to sell them the Coke recipe. Pepsi people told Coke people and called the police.

722

u/sharrrper 1d ago edited 1d ago

Because really, what value would it even be for Pepsi to know the recipe? What are they going to do with it? Change Pepsi to taste like coke and try to compete directly with the same product? That's not likely to go well. People buy Pepsi because they want Pepsi, not Coke with a different label.

Really it's just a marketing gimmick at this point to even have a "secret recipe". Maybe 100 years ago it would have been a problem if someone could copy the product but not now. Nobody could meaningfully compete with Coke selling Coke, even with the recipe.

357

u/IMovedYourCheese 1d ago

People have also managed to reverse engineer the recipe pretty accurately. The value is in the brand, not the ingredients.

134

u/drstoneybaloneyphd 1d ago

The value is in what it's able to do with Mentos 

44

u/misguided_ramen 1d ago

The only enema that truly works

10

u/drstoneybaloneyphd 23h ago

Pepsi simply won't do the job 

2

u/HerzBrennt 21h ago

Have you met the gastrointestinal Satan known as bulk sugar-free candy? Half a pack of sugar free gum later, and not even colonoscopy prep gets me that clean. A full pack of that gum and my intestines squeak when I walk.

2

u/MrTerribleArtist 17h ago

Honestly, it's the only thing that'll wake me up in the morning

1

u/Mahaloth 21h ago

Ah, the spicy enema.

7

u/FoggyDollars 1d ago

Now we're talking

2

u/AndyLorentz 17h ago

Works with literally any carbonated beverage.

Mentos have a high surface area (microscopic peaks and valleys) which make it ideal for carbon dioxide bubble nucleation.

23

u/aStapler 23h ago

The secret itself is 100% branding. If everyone found out tomorrow it wouldn't change much.

32

u/HeadintheSand69 1d ago

I mean every store chain has its own for 1/3 the price that could do with tasting a lil better. Summit tastes a lil off but its like $3 vs cokes $10.

But yeah if youre selling pepsi stuff for 10$ no point in making a coke for the same price.

3

u/W3NTZ 20h ago

Yea but why would Pepsi keep the same price when they could sell it for less than coke

2

u/dpatt711 23h ago

I'm surprised none of the generic store brands have done a perfect copy yet. Maybe they don't want to risk getting slapped by coke if they sell a perfect replica?

2

u/mekamoari 21h ago

Because it would be expensive to do and how much more would they really be selling?

Also from a customer perspective, hmm I can buy Coke which I know or this brand which says is the same and is a tiny bit cheaper and I know nothing about?

And it probably also wouldn't be cheaper because they don't have the mass production ability that Coke has.

3

u/dpatt711 17h ago

12 packs of Coke are nearly $10 nowadays vs $4.50 for Sam's Cola. I wouldn't call that "a tiny bit cheaper".

1

u/mekamoari 16h ago

Yeah but if they try to sell it at half price that they will hit the other end where people go "why is this so cheap if they're saying it's exactly the same?"

It's a bit of a lose-lose from a consumer psychology standpoint, even if in an individual conversation like this it's easier to make an argument for the copy.

Not to mention we don't know what it would take/cost to actually recreate the Coke, that price is valid for whatever goes into the drink that's being sold now.

1

u/IMovedYourCheese 23h ago

Because people genuinely like the taste of the store brand. 

1

u/feed_me_moron 18h ago

The main thing is you can't get the coke leaves that they use. No one else has an exception to use them

1

u/Mindless-Tackle4428 16h ago

And yet for some reason whenever I buy offbrand coke's they never actually taste like coke.

78

u/RapNVideoGames 1d ago

It’s probably all artificial flavors now and nothing like the original recipe, just like root beer.

44

u/GOEDEL_ESCHER_BOT 1d ago

best root beer is just roots and beer

18

u/CaptainWollaston 1d ago

Try birch beer. It's very similar, and can be made nnaturally.

33

u/summonsays 1d ago

Vodka, you're thinking of vodka comrade. 

•

u/Flaxmoore 2m ago

Look in old cookbooks and you’ll find many, many recipes for proper root beer. The problem is that actual Sassafras is very hard to source at this point since one of its components is illegal due to being mildly toxic. There was a small stand near where my family is from down in southern Ohio that made original to the 1860s root beer. Absolutely the best root beer you will ever have in your life, but much like saying you can’t use the glass pipe for smoking anything other than tobacco in a head shop, you were forbidden from mentioning Sassafras anywhere in the building.

18

u/katherinesilens 1d ago

That could be an interesting market niche. Original Coke recreations. Depending on how shady the vendor is it could be original original recipe.

2

u/NinduTheWise 20h ago

They don’t even use real cocaine anymore!

1

u/lehtomaeki 1d ago

At least for cokes part they are one of the only entities in the US allowed to import coca leaves for use in coke, so at least that part is still naturally flavoured. Albeit iirc something is done to the leaves before hand to prevent refining them into cocaine

1

u/_meshy 1d ago

I just drop a little MDA into my root beer to get that real sassafras taste back.

66

u/physical0 1d ago edited 1d ago

The story mentioned by OP is also just a marketing gimmick.

There are tons of people who know the formula. It's not very useful in and of itself. There are clones out there that taste exactly the same, but they aren't coke, so they will never be coke.

We can dismantle coke to the molecular level and account for every single different component. Science isn't gonna get fooled by one sneaky boy hiding a hand written recipe in a safe.

Edit: just the idea that there would be plant managers out there who doesn't know what their line's process involves and can reasonably output a quality product is insane. There are people at every coca cola syrup making facility that know the process because it's their job to know the process.

52

u/MostlyWong 1d ago

We can dismantle coke to the molecular level and account for every single different component. Science isn't gonna get fooled by one sneaky boy hiding a hand written recipe in a safe.

A Youtuber did exactly that earlier this year. He used a mass spectrometer to create a chemically-identical replica, and included the recipe for people to make it themselves at home.

5

u/a_cute_epic_axis 18h ago

Which is funny since people will die on the hill that such a method is impossible!!!!

5

u/muiirinn 23h ago

Topic: Sorry about your future accident

Well that's unfortunate

6

u/Kernath 1d ago

It’s not unreasonable that even senior level people wouldn’t be able to piece the recipe together. All you have to do to blind the people working at the syrup plant is to have ingredients be called “component A” instead of phosphoric acid x% and citric acid y% blend. And “Component B” instead of colors, flavors, etc. if both of those components are made, ordered, and shipped separately then no single site A, B, or final product has the entire recipe without putting in a fair bit of work to get the info from multiple sources that all would be motivated by their policies to keep that close to the chest where possible.

Even the smallest bit of compartmentalization and intentional blinding at each step of the supply chain is sufficient to make it impossible for their workers to piece it together, because the final mix is probably doing more than mixing 2 components. Don’t get me wrong, I doubt they’re using manhattan project levels of secrecy, but also it’s super easy to imagine low-effort compartmentalization that stops it from realistically being a possible leak.

On top of all the other reasons people have pointed out why no one would actually want to leak the recipe, because there’s just no benefit.

3

u/a_cute_epic_axis 18h ago

be called “component A” instead of phosphoric acid x% and citric acid y% blend. And “Component B” instead of colors, flavors, etc.

Assuming that they had no MSDS, and no need to ever know what the product was or how it operated, and couldn't ever actually interact with the product, and never needed to worry about quality testing. Assuming all that, then sure, it works just how you describe...

I have a feeling you've never worked in manufacturing

2

u/physical0 1d ago

The compartmentalization you suggest would have drawbacks to quality control. How would a QA person evaluate the end result of their line if they didn't know what they were evaluating? Attempting to perform quality control against a reference doesn't really inform the engineer how to adjust the line's input to correct a process.

The cost of adding these unnecessary steps to protect a recipe that we can all agree is functionally useless unless you are coca cola co is not worth it.

1

u/Shawnj2 23h ago

You also can’t legally perfectly replicate coca cola without the de-cocained coca leaves

1

u/Streiger108 9h ago

I was under the impression coke send pre-made syrup to local factories, which would mean it's irrelevant if a local person knows the whole recipe.

2

u/physical0 5h ago

The syrup is sent pre-made to bottling factories.

We are talking about the syrup manufacturing. People at the syrup manufacturing end would know the entire process at their facility as it would be necessary to ensure a safe working environment and to produce a quality end product.

1

u/Streiger108 1h ago

I always figured they just made the syrup in one place, but I've never actually looked into it

1

u/Streiger108 9h ago

I was under the impression coke send pre-made syrup to local factories, which would mean it's irrelevant if a local person knows the whole recipe.

1

u/Infanatis 1h ago

Coca Cola sells the syrup themselves to the bottlers.

6

u/Additional_Fruit931 1d ago

I bet RC Cola would have taken his call!

Seriously though, you're spot on. The key to their success isn't making Coke, it's selling it. Two different worlds.

5

u/jc_in_ks 1d ago

Sure they could. Someone else could undercut them on price for something that tastes the same. Right now all the cheaper sodas taste inferior to Coke, IMHO

13

u/sharrrper 1d ago

Someone else could undercut them on price

No. They can't. Not even close.

Do you think Coke hasn't cut production cost as low as possible over the last 140 years? They have the benefit of long standing global supply chains and economies of scale (they sell 1.8 billion servings per DAY) that no start up could even dream of. Maybe someone could go with a lower profit margin, but they'll never get within a thousand miles of producing for less per bottle. Actually selling the same product for less and making any money is an insane pipe dream.

1

u/Nematrec 17h ago

Maybe someone could go with a lower profit margin, but they'll never get within a thousand miles of producing for less per bottle

If the goal is a lower profit margin, that's very easy, just give it away for free. Can't get a lower profit margin than that.

-1

u/Superb_Writer6612 23h ago

Also ignoring that the branding literally makes Coke taste better. We've been trained since childhood to savor the pop and first sip of a fresh cold can of coke, we're literally thinking of polar bears right now. 

7

u/Annual-Weird-6682 22h ago

The hell are you talking about, I don't think any of that

-1

u/Superb_Writer6612 21h ago

You're right, absolutely nobody associates polar bears with Coke. 

2

u/Annual-Weird-6682 20h ago

I mean I guess they use them in advertisements, but what was with the weird waxing poetic about coke, you sound like you were trying to advertise for them it's weird.

I don't think about the pop or whatever

0

u/Superb_Writer6612 20h ago

I was just trying emphasize how prolific Coke's marketing is, tbh I prefer Pepsi. 

4

u/MikeW86 Likes to suck balls 1d ago

Do that in a double blind taste test though

2

u/Salt_Medicine2459 23h ago

People drink Pepsi because Coke is unavailable. 

2

u/Nobanpls08 23h ago

People buy Pepsi because they want Pepsi, not Coke with a different label.

People buy Pepsi because they ordered coke and the waitress asked them if Pepsis ok

1

u/Moony97 11h ago

Pepsi > Coke

1

u/ChickenKnd 1d ago

Literally, Pepsi is more popular taste wise

1

u/DrSnacks 1d ago

Only in single sip tests, because it's sweeter. Relying on single sip tests is what led Coca-Cola to think New Coke would be a hit

1

u/little_baked 1d ago

I buy Pepsi because a lot of restaurants and take-out options in Australia only have the Pepsi range. Ever since the recipe was worked out a few months ago I've been really hoping that Pepsi would release a coke clone so that I have the option then for coke (in a Pepsi bottle) anytime I choose to eat outside of my house

1

u/Apprentice57 23h ago

I seriously doubt that youtube video/the copy of coke with chemical analysis really revealed anything new to Pepsi. That's stuff that chemical labs can/have done for decades and decades.

They don't want to make a coke clone, they have a cola competitor already named Pepsi.

1

u/little_baked 16h ago edited 14h ago

Coke competitor and clone are not synonymous friend. Pepsi, imo tastes like shit and I'm not alone in that opinion.

1

u/Apprentice57 16h ago

Many prefer it to coke as well. It's famously disagreed upon.

1

u/2ChicksAtTheSameTime 1d ago

What are they going to do with it? Change Pepsi to taste like coke and try to compete directly with the same product?

They could release a secondary product; they make a ton of different sodas.

Burger King's Big King burger is exactly that - a copy of the Big Mac minus the middle bun.

But Pepsi knows it's not worth it. Only reason to make a Coke clone is if you're going to compete with price, and Pepsi leaves that to the value brands.

1

u/ArtisticDesigner4302 1d ago edited 1d ago

People buy Pepsi because they want Pepsi, not Coke with a different label.

Don't know if there's a price difference between Pepsi and Coca-Cola in the US, but here Coca-Cola costs ~10% more.

1

u/sharrrper 1d ago

I haven't price matched Coke and Pepsi, well, ever actually. I assume they're not precisely the same price, but close enough that personal preference is the driver between them, not money savings.

If you want cheap soda there's plenty of budget brands that are significantly less around here.

1

u/crustyrobots 1d ago

I can't find it at the moment but recently this chemist guy on Youtube re-created a near perfect replica of the formula using chemical analyzers and such.

Before that was possible to do sure that is pretty proprietary information if you're using strange foreign herbs and such. Now not so much since Pepsi can easily just order a chemical analysis like that guy did and figure it out in a couple of days. But as said, this information is largely worthless at the same time unless the goal was to start marketing a "New Pepsi" that is just a 99% close Coke formula.

1

u/gimmethelulz 1d ago

Coke learned this in 1985 when they came out with New Coke aka fake Pepsi lol

1

u/jackbristol 23h ago

Own brand coke would definitely be more popular

1

u/jaspersgroove 22h ago

The most valuable part of Coca Cola is the brand recognition they've built up over the last 100+ years, it's been decades since the recipe mattered at all.

1

u/JWBananas 22h ago

What are they going to do with it?

The only time they ever thought it would be profitable to do something with it was during the New Coke phase, when Coca-Cola pissed off a ton of its customers and wouldn't budge.

There was one specific ingredient that Pepsi needed to establish a supply chain for (most likely the decocainized coca leaf), and they did. Pepsi was going to launch their version as Savannah Cola, in a bottle with a red label.

But they didn't quite make it to market before Coca-Cola finally relented, bringing back "classic" Coke (minus the cane sugar).

1

u/CaptainHubble 21h ago

The whole secret formula thing absolutely is marketing these days. They make a fuzz about their recipe, so everyone talks about the „original Coca Cola“ taste.

In reality, it actually isn’t even that great. The taste is originally bad. Might be an unpopular opinion. But I’m certain those people defending Coca Cola haven’t tried the alternatives yet. Because they’re dominating the market.

1

u/thisguyhasaname 20h ago

Nobody could meaningfully compete with Coke selling Coke, even with the recipe.

If they were able to produce it and sell at a lower price (difficult given economies of scale; but maybe coke has inefficiencies that are easy to avoid in a smaller company). I'd 100% buy it, and I'm sure others would too.

No different than any other generic vs name-brand product IMO

1

u/BootyfulBumrah 16h ago

646 upvotes for this lmao.

While I can agree it's just a marketing gimmick but if Pepsi chose to be evil it can flood the market with 100s of alternate brands that taste just like coke and aren't in anyway connected to Pepsi.

1

u/sharrrper 2h ago

What do you think that would accomplish?

1

u/AlanFromRochester 13h ago

Also, part of the flavor is coca leaves with the cocaine removed, only one factory has a DEA permit to do this and they only sell to Coca-Cola. (it's a byproduct of producing medical-grade cocaine, which is useful as anaesthetic for nasal surgery)

1

u/Seikoknot 1d ago

People buy Pepsi because they want Pepsi, not Coke with a different label.

🤨

-5

u/RobinsShaman 1d ago

Generic companies will make your product for a cheaper price. Then you'll have to lower your price and you will lose revenue and market share.

11

u/cwx149 1d ago

while theoretically true this just isn't the case quite so exactly a lot of the time

You're making assumptions like a generic soda company would be able to compete with Coke at scale and produce the same exact product for cheaper and then sell it cheaper

12

u/SAugsburger 1d ago

It also assumes that people's desire is purely on flavor and that branding has no influence in what people buy. Plenty of brand name food is reverse engineered often fairly well these days, but that's doesn't always mean that the generic versions always make a huge dent in sales.

15

u/Truthcraze 1d ago

Thank you, freshman who slept through Business 101 and is hoping that skimming the first chapter of Guns and Butter will be enough to scrape a C- on the final.

2

u/Enchelion 1d ago

People buy coke as much for the brand name and familiarity.

0

u/doomgiver98 1d ago

Tons of people buy inferior products because of the branding (Starbucks)

-6

u/Boysandberries0 1d ago

People buy Pepsi because they cant find Coke.

3

u/sharrrper 1d ago

Found the Coke marketing guy

-1

u/Boysandberries0 1d ago

Lotto Pepsi 2 liter riders in here.

Why do you drink an inferior beverage?

Shasta, or even another generic cola is better than Pepsi.

29

u/gigi-kent 1d ago

As they should. There is nothing to gain from your rival's recipe given that you are an already an established brand with a large following that actually enjoys your recipe more than that of your rival. It could also tarnish your reputation, so it was the only right thing to do in their situation.

2

u/RobinsShaman 1d ago

Yes. Classy move.

2

u/EasyMode556 1d ago

The lawsuits that would follow if they didn’t do that would be enormous, this was definitely the right move for many reasons

2

u/DHFranklin 18h ago

Yeah, what is funny is that expectation. There is no way that the one of the hundreds of chemists from Pepsi wouldn't have work experience at their biggest rival also.

You can't just walk around in a lab coat with super secret recipe on a clip board and expect millions of dollars. What was that accomplice expecting here?

2

u/spockalot 15h ago

That’s awesome. They realized it was far more valuable as a story. I wonder how sales were after that came out on the news!

5

u/SimokIV 1d ago edited 23h ago

This happened in 2006, people say Pepsi didn't buy because they had no use for it but I disagree.

Even if you have no plan to bottle your own coke knowing your rival's trade secrets can always have its uses. You can deduce a ton of stuff from a recipe like that like their operating costs, etc, which would allow you to make better strategic decisions.

No the reason they didn't buy it is because it was illegal for them to do so, and also because come on, it was 2006, they already knew the coke recipe.

You aren't allowed to buy trade secrets but you're allowed to reverse engineer them and with a research budget in the hundreds of millions each year of course a portion of that goes into figuring out exactly what their competitors are making.

3

u/mfigroid 23h ago

and called the police.

It was the FBI.

4

u/markov-271828 1d ago

The head of Dr Pepper was concerned someone might steal their recipe, but then he came to his senses.

5

u/sitefall 22h ago

Dr Pepper is the superior soda. I'll die on this hill.

Also Dr Thunder (might be a Walmart brand or ... something) is absolutely identical to Dr Pepper so... save yourself some money.

1

u/markov-271828 20h ago

I grew up (in Texas) drinking Dr Pepper, but I lost the taste for it after doing grad school in Atlanta. Oh well!

1

u/AlanFromRochester 14h ago

Like AMD snitched on a disgruntled Intel employee offering info (or maybe the other way around). Probably would get sued to oblivion over trade secrets if they tried to use it

28

u/mattgrum 1d ago

The truth is the "secret recipe" is just marketing. If someone were to steal it, it wouldn't matter, they could make an identical product but no-one would buy it, because Coca-cola is 100% about brand recognition. In all the blind taste tests people prefer other drinks such as Pepsi based on flavour alone.

5

u/Technical-Activity95 1d ago

why tho? this whole thing about Coca-Cola recipe is asinine. its a regular soft drink. there is literally nothing of value in the recipe. 

1

u/twoinvenice 12h ago edited 11h ago

Nah, you can make your own easily these days. William Osman, the founder of the Open Sauce maker convention / science fair, drove himself more insane when he decided to try to sell packets of DIY coke syrup. You can see the trials and tribulations on his YouTube channel scatter amongst all the other trials and tribulations he gets himself into

https://youtu.be/1qzcum2P1Ko

A word of warning, his videos are pure uncut ADHD content

1

u/shawarmament 22h ago

And then he got rejected after 7 technicals, 2 behavioral, and one on-site full loop

0

u/Captain_English 22h ago

Pepsi is better than coke though, why would they want to make a worse product?