Pepsi’s logo redesign could have been just a simple marketing tactic. But that wouldn’t fly for a brand known for challenging the status quo. Instead, we recognized it as a major milestone and crafted an engaging months-long story around the new visual identity—one that leveraged Pepsi’s history of unapologetic moves to cast a bold vision for the future leaning into changing consumer preferences. Pepsi 125 underscored how a brand can be part of the zeitgeist for over a century, and its forward-looking narrative minimized any negativity around the design. Do people care about a brand’s anniversary? Pepsi proved yes.

Beverage leaders are continuing to innovate to drive relevance among the next generation for consumers that are increasingly distracted and less brand loyal than older generations. In the crowded beverage space, there are many emerging brands helping to drive increased demand for low and no-sugar options. The global market for zero sugar beverages was estimated at $3.3 billion in 2023 and is expected to exceed a value of $13 billion by 2033 – a huge opportunity for growth for all beverages, including carbonated soft drinks like Pepsi.

The opportunity to capture more of the Zero Sugar market coincided with Pepsi’s need to refresh its logo, which looked outdated and was difficult to feature in digital executions because of its disparate elements, including the Pepsi name in small text below the iconic red, blue and white globe. The current look also didn’t represent the vibrant, playful personality that Pepsi was known for. But as history has proven, logo redesigns that aren’t received well can be PR disasters (see: Gap, Yahoo, Pizza Hut, many others), and a global brand like Pepsi is no exception. Look no further than Pepsi’s last logo refresh in 2009, which was accidentally leaked prematurely and sparked a decidedly mixed—and often negative—conversation, causing the brand to lose control of the narrative.

Pepsi wanted a compelling and cohesive brand story around its first logo refresh in 14 years, both to engage fans and connect a multitude of campaigns surrounding the redesign roll-out. After a disastrous leak of the redesign in 2009, which made everyone on the internet a design critic, the brand was sensitive to the news getting out with no context.

Brief: Leveraging the refreshed Pepsi visual identity, build a compelling consumer awareness and engagement campaign that:

1) Heroes Zero Sugar as the future of the brand (and ultimately, the future of the PepsiCo beverage portfolio).

2) Reinforces Pepsi’s ubiquitous role in culture—from dining to movies and music—solidifying the brand as one that is “timely” vs “timeless.”

3) Controls the brand narrative at launch and set the stage for additional news beats throughout the year, and 2024 global rollout.

Objective: Make the biggest splash possible while keeping the haters at bay.

Pepsi 125: A year-long celebration of the brand’s role in culture over the past 125 years that rewarded fans with the perfect mix of new and nostalgic moments— all with Pepsi Zero Sugar taking center stage.

The Pepsi 125 campaign created a timely way to reinforce the brand’s place in culture and drive media and social conversation around the future. The platform also gave more opportunities to hero the Pepsi Zero Sugar brand priority.

Starting with the unveiling of Pepsi’s bold new visual identity, which prominently featured the color black as a nod to Pepsi Zero Sugar, Pepsi’s 125th birthday followed with 125 days of engaging content and activations like The Pepsi 125 Diner immersive dining experience and a re-release of five of the brand’s most iconic commercials remastered with the new branding. More IRL and digital touchpoints brought the bold new Pepsi to dining, sports and entertainment.

Insight: Successful visual identity refreshes that reached mass audiences (e.g., Burger King, Sprite) had a clear “why” tied to a larger business objective and used the design as a vehicle to share in a tangible, memorable way.

Key message: Pepsi continues to push culture forward as a champion of unapologetic enjoyment and always reinvents itself to keep up with consumer preferences, including demand for no-sugar beverages – the future of our business.

Audience: As the “choice of every generation,” Pepsi’s target was broad, including Gen Z and older consumers who grew up with Pepsi and now may be looking for zero sugar alternatives. PR focused on driving positive conversation in U.S. consumer news, business, marketing/design, and food/beverage titles.

Creation and distribution of assets: We developed a Pepsi 125 narrative that underscored how the brand is both “timely” and “timeless" and brought it to life via rich storytelling and fan experiences.

From March-November 2023, Pepsi 125 came to life through four distinct pulse points:

1. Unveiled the new visual identity via embargoed interviews across key verticals including Fast Company, Ad Age, CNN followed by a global press release and widespread outreach; developed risk strategy to get ahead of leaks and criticism, including global monitoring across 12 markets/4 languages.

2. Announced a 125 day journey through the brand’s history, including The Pepsi 125 Diner; issued a broadcast news release and orchestrated a press and influencer event with over 80 attendees.

3. Promoted the re-release of five iconic commercials during the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards, including coordinating a PEOPLE exclusive story featuring a quote from Britney Spears and social post from Madonna.

4. Secured interviews with Shaq to promote new Pepsi Mini Cans commercial with Access Hollywood, Yahoo! Sports, Sports Illustrated, and more.

Scale: Global, with focused U.S. storytelling

Pepsi 125 swept the news over 9 months:

• 26B+ impressions from 1,960+ earned media stories across business, marketing, news, design, food/beverage, lifestyle and entertainment titles: Fast Company, USA Today, CNN, TODAY, INSIDER, FOX Business, Bloomberg, Adweek, Ad Age, Dieline, Food Network, HYPEBEAST, PEOPLE, Billboard and Entertainment Weekly. Pepsi’s redesign was on the front page of Ad Age’s print edition and featured heavily on TV, including Late Night with Seth Meyers, CBS Morning News, and 560 local broadcast segments.

• 76% of the initial redesign news included Pepsi Zero Sugar messaging

• 97% were feature stories, 81% included branded assets, and nearly 1/3 featured a quote from a Pepsi executive – proving the brand was in control of the narrative.

• Media accolades, including Ad Age’s “#1 brand redesign of 2023” and Fast Company’s declaration that “it’s the best Pepsi has looked in decades.”

Target audience:

• The new logo had 99% positive news and social sentiment.

• The Pepsi 125 Diner immediately sold out and generated a 18K+ person waitlist.

• Purchase consideration for Pepsi Zero Sugar increased 8.2 pts and purchase intent increased 2.4 pts among those aware of the new logo.

Business:

Our hero Pepsi Zero Sugar had strong performance, passing Coke Zero Sugar growth in 10 of 13 periods in 2023; Sales were +36% YOY and PSZ gained share (+0.2) aided by overall positioning and awareness. Pepsi proudly cracked the top 100 of Kantar BrandZ World’s Most Valuable Global Brands (+17%) attributed to the redesign.