Finally, a soft drink for REAL men

[Ivan Seeking]

NEW YORK – Dudes don't drink diet.

Or at least that's the idea behind Dr Pepper Ten, a 10-calorie soft drink Dr Pepper Snapple Group is rolling out on Monday with a macho ad campaign that proclaims "It's not for women." The soft drink was developed after the company's research found that men shy away from diet drinks that aren't perceived as "manly" enough.

To appeal to men, Dr Pepper made its Ten drink 180 degrees different than Diet Dr Pepper. It has calories and sugar unlike its diet counterpart. Instead of the dainty tan bubbles on the diet can, Ten will be wrapped in gunmetal grey packaging with silver bullets. And while Diet Dr Pepper's marketing is women-friendly, the ad campaign for Ten goes out of its way to eschew women...

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/story/2011-10-10/dr-pepper-for-men/50717788/1

As soon as I can quit dragging my knuckles on the ground, I'm going to run out and buy some of this!

Now if they could just make eggs a little less feminine

 

[Pengwuino]

I couldn't believe that they were still doing this since it has been out a few months already. Coming from an international corporation, it seems quite... risky?

 

[Loren Booda]

Get Highball T!

 

[Ben Niehoff]

I shy away from diet drinks because I don't know what carcenogenic chemicals they've used in place of sugar.

But hell, I also shy away from non-diet drinks because they taste disgusting. I guess Pepsi can't win with me.

I drink only four things: water, hot chocolate (home made with whole milk), beer, and liquor.

 

[phylotree]

A common mistaken assumption in most societies is that people tend to believe that alcoholic drinks would increase testosterone level or masculine behaviors and fail to even identify who is actually who until they find a cross-ness in male chromosomes far outgrowing the Y thing. I like men who drink milk. I take 2 glasses a day and 1 cup of 3-in-1 coffee bag after each meal. I don't have cokes after lunch, only sometimes at midnight when I work late.

 

[MathematicalPhysicist]

If this thread becomes a thread of what we, as men drink. Then I drink juices mainly apple cider, grape fruit, orange juice and lemmonade, root bear and plain water.

I used to drink Coke quite a lot as a teenager and also Nestea ice tea, but I abandoned them, cause they have too much sugar and caffeine for me.

 

[Kholdstare]

I mostly drink water. Sometimes a little spirit. I don't like anything else.

 

[chiro]

I drink water: guess I'm not hardcore. Are you hardcore?

 

[Pythagorean]

I order the queen size steak at my restraunt. The jack is too small and the King is twice as expensive for not twice the meat. Clever marketing...

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

How about a soft drink for adults. Half the sugar, no artificial sweetener, no cloyingly sweet taste.

 

[mege]

How about a soft drink for adults. Half the sugar, no artificial sweetener, no cloyingly sweet taste.

Iced Tea (unsweetened) and Beer come to mind which fit these qualifications - depending on the social situation, of course.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

It's still Dr. Pepper.
Get me gin and tonic in a can and we'll talk.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Iced Tea (unsweetened) and Beer.

Not soft enough.

 

[daveb]

Water most of the time, unless it's at abar or at home after a great meal. Then it's the McAllan's, Lagavullin, Aberfeldy or Bailey's. Not much of anything else.

 

[cepheid]

Is it just me, or does the can design actually seem kind of feminine?

 

[drizzle]

Cause it's for guys.

 

[micromass]

But what if the men are complex?

 

[rhody]

It's all about one thing, attention, the buzz. Maybe it will work, backfire, or a little bit of both. I don't care because I gave up carbonated soda years ago. I view it as a sign of either boredom (someone in PR wants to stir up some trouble, or appear edgy, edgy is cool, right ?) or desperation in hopes of attracting new followers to Dr Pepper.

Rhody...

 

[TheMadMonk]

It's still Dr. Pepper.
Get me gin and tonic in a can and we'll talk.

Gin and Tonic is sold in cans here in the UK, I'd provide a link but I'm not sure if that is allowed. Some of them are actually drinkable as well.

 

[drizzle]

But what if the men are complex?

I believe their imaginary part will function very well. :p

 

[leroyjenkens]

Yeah THAT'S the reason I don't drink diet soda. They got me.

What boneheads are they surveying that give them ideas like this?

 

[lisab]

But what if the men are complex?

I've known men with imaginary parts.

 

[Monique]

You already had a soft drink marketed to men: Coca-Cola Zero, the bloke Coke.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca-Cola_Zero

 

[drizzle]

Coca-Cola Zero is for men! :shy:

 

[nitsuj]

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/story/2011-10-10/dr-pepper-for-men/50717788/1

As soon as I can quit dragging my knuckles on the ground, I'm going to run out and buy some of this!

Now if they could just make eggs a little less feminine

OMG too funny!

 

[CallMeShady]

That's a pretty smart way of marketing their product by targeting men.

 

[rootX]

That's a pretty smart way of marketing their product by targeting men.

i wonder if they are targeting men or women

 

[russ_watters]

You already had a soft drink marketed to men: Coca-Cola Zero, the bloke Coke.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca-Cola_Zero

It makes sense to market the same product separately to men and women, but I'm still not clear on if Diet Coke and Coke Zero are the same thing, which just irritates me. I do wonder, though, if chosing a target market and going after it exclusively can be counter-productive for a product with a broad potential market. Then on the flip-side if you have a product with a narrow target demographic and you try to artificially broaden it, you may risk losing the very people who buy the most of it.

Either way, I love the the recent trend of ultra-masculine, paordy commercials - they're hilarious. There's a good Kia Optima commercial where the Sandman trips and dumps a full bag of his dream dust on a sleeping guy, who launches into an intense racecar driver/rockstar fantasy, filled with boobs. I guess Kia doesn't care if any women buy that car.

There's also the Kia Soul which, clearly, is being marketed to post-apocalyptic hamsters.




I'm on a horse.

 

[lisab]

It makes sense to market the same product separately to men and women, but I'm still not clear on if Diet Coke and Coke Zero are the same thing, which just irritates me. I do wonder, though, if chosing a target market and going after it exclusively can be counter-productive for a product with a broad potential market. Then on the flip-side if you have a product with a narrow target demographic and you try to artificially broaden it, you may risk losing the very people who buy the most of it.

Either way, I love the the recent trend of ultra-masculine, paordy commercials - they're hilarious. There's a good Kia Optima commercial where the Sandman trips and dumps a full bag of his dream dust on a sleeping guy, who launches into an intense racecar driver/rockstar fantasy, filled with boobs. I guess Kia doesn't care if any women buy that car.

There's also the Kia Soul which, clearly, is being marketed to post-apocalyptic hamsters.




I'm on a horse.

When I think of gender-specific products I always think of the VW Bug. A car with a bud vase built into the dash...?

 

[turbo]

I already have a soft-drink. It's called Molson.

 

[QuarkCharmer]

What exactly makes this any different than Diet Dr. Pepper? The diet variant has 0 calories, this has 10? So, it is effeminate to drink 0 calorie soft drinks but 10 calories is macho?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

What exactly makes this any different than Diet Dr. Pepper? The diet variant has 0 calories, this has 10? So, it is effeminate to drink 0 calorie soft drinks but 10 calories is macho?

Yes. You know, 10, like Bo Derek. And it is gunmetal gray with no girly bubbles.

As much as this is silly, it will be a bit interesting to see if actually lasts.

 

[phylotree]

How amusing it is to me to see more and more ads these days on media introducing gender-specific products online!
For example, http://www.icpvn.com/index.php?option=com_productbook&Itemid=30&task=pdetail&cid=2&pid=1 or http://www.kao.com/my/mensbiore/index.html. To those who are not much considering daily biological jokes on gender issues, usually those who don't care about biology, they wouldn't reckon it as a funny stuff at all. But what is the X-Man supposed to mean ? the real man ? We may consider an X or Z as a sign of complex behaviors being performed by a female or a homosexual. People in different societies have different views about what constitutes their own judgment towards femininity or masculinity. In some culture, many people would feel a little bad to sit next to a man in a restaurant who is drinking a glass of colorful juices, especially the colors for girls [pink or red], with his legs crossed. Yet in others, they may in a happy mood meet and interact with others wearing pink suits or girlish T-shirts as it's indifferent to them. The differences are caused by knowledge differences, aren't they ? Gender racists may ignorantly wonder where gayness in human beings comes from, open-minded people will believe that human differences are a sign of diversity and are ready to accept everything, while the biologists might take it that homosexuality can't separate itself from social pressures as a special case of genetic diversity and human brain evolution in general.

 

[SW VandeCarr]

The most manly soft drink is unsweetened sarsaparilla. That's what they drank in places like and Dodge City, Deadwood and Tombstone when the American West was wild and men were men. Of course, that's when they weren't drinking the hard stuff which was probably rare. However, if someone revived it, it might sell. I doubt many women could stand it.

EDIT: Remember, in those days you had to stay sober when you were playing poker and a shoot-out could happen at any time, so maybe "sassparilla" (as it was commonly pronounced) was the manly way to go.

 

[turbo]

When I was a kid, Birch Beer was really popular around here. It was lightly sweetened, but not like regular sodas.